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LETTER 


CORPULENCE, 

Addressed  to  too.  public 
By     WILLIAM     BANTING. 


REPRINTED  FROM    THE    THIRD    LONDON    EDITION. 


WITH     A     REVIEW     OF    THE     WORK    FROM 
BLACKWOOD'S    MAGAZINE, 

AND  AN  ARTICLE  ON 

CORPULENCY  &  LEANNESS 

FROM   HARPER'S  WEEKLY. 


SAX    FRANCISCO: 

PUBLISHED    BY    -A-.    RCdVCAKT    <Sc    CO. 
417  k  lit  MONTGOMERY  STREET. 

1865. 


This  letter  is  respectfully  dedicated  to  the  Public 
simply  and  entirely  from  an  earnest  desire  to  confer  a 
a  benefit  on  my  fellow  creatures. 

W.  B. 


Library. 

BANTING  ON  CORPULENCE. 


Of  all  the  parasites  that  affect  humanity,  I  do  notknow 
of,  nor  can  I  imagine,  any  more  distressing  than  thai 
of  Obesity,  and.  having  just  emerged  from  a  very  long 
probation  in  this  affliction,  I  am  desirous  of  circula 
my  humble  knowledge  and  experience  for  the  benefit 
of  my  fellow  man,  with  an  earnest  hope  it  may  ]  sad 
to  the  same  comfort  and  happiness  I  now  feel  under 
the  extraordinary  change — which  might  almost  be 
termed  miraculous,  had  it  not  been  accomplished  by 
the  most  simple  common-sense  means. 

Obesity  seems  to  me  very  little  understood  orpr  >p- 
erly  appreciated  by  the  faculty  and  the  public  generally. 
or  the  former  would  long  ere  this  have  hit  upon  the 
cause  for  so  lamentable  a  disease,  and  applied  effective 
remedies,  whilst  the  latter  would  have  spared  their 
injudicious  indulgence  in  remarks  and  sneers,  frequently 
painful  in  society,  and  which,  even  on  the  strongesl 
mind,  have  an  unhappy  tendency  ;  but  1  sin- 
trust  this  humble  effort  at  exposition  may  Lead  I  >  a 
more  perfect  ventilation  of  the  subjecl  and  a  b  tter 
feeling  for  the  afflicted. 

It  would  afford  me  infinite  pleasure  and  satisfac  ion 
to  name  the  author  of  my  redemption  from  tic  calam- 
ity, as  he  is  the  only  one  that  I  have  been  able  to  find 
(and   my  search   has   not    been   sparing)  who 


-i  BANTING   ON    CORPULENCE. 

thoroughly  up  in  the  question  ;  but  such  publicity 
might  bo  construed  improperly,  and  I  have,  therefore, 
only  to  offer  my  personal  experience  as  the  stepping- 
stone  to  public  investigation,  and  to  proceed  with  my 

narrative  of  facts,  earnestly  hoping  the  reader  will 
patiently  peruse  and  thoughtfully  consider  it,  with  for- 
bearance for  any  fault  of  style  or  diction,  and  for  any 
seeming  presumption  in  publishing  it. 

I  have  felt  some  difficulty  in  deciding  on  the  proper 
and  best  course  of  action.  At  one  time  I  thought  the 
Editor  of  the  Lancet  would  kindly  publish  a  letter 
from  me  on  the  subject,  but  further  reflection  led  me 
to  doubt  whether  an  insignificant  individual  would  be 
noticed  without  some  special  introduction.  In  the 
April  number  of  the  (Jon/hill  Magazine  I  read  with 
much  interest  an  article  on  the  subject — defining  toler- 
ably well  the  effects,  but  offering  no  tangible  remedy, 
or  even  positive  solution  of  the  problem — "  What  is 
the  cause  of  Obesity''"  I  was  pleased  with  the  article 
as  a  whole,  but  objected  to  some  portions,  and  had 
prepared  a  letter  to  the  Editor  of  that  Magazine,  offer- 
ing my  experience  on  the  subject  ;  but  again  it  struck 
me  that  an  unknown  individual  like  myself  would  have 
but  little  prospect  of  notice  ;  so  I  finally  resolved  to 
publish  and  circulate  this  Pamphlet,  with  no  other 
reason,  motive,  or  expectation  than  an  earnest  desire 
to  help  those  who  happen  to  be  afflicted  as  I  was,  for 
that  corpulence  is  remediable  I  am  well  convinced,  and 
shall  be  delighted  if  I  can  induce  others  to  think  so. 
The  object  I  have  in  view  impels  me  to  enter  into 
minute  particulars,  as  well  as  general  observations,  and 
to  revert  to  bygone  years,  in  order  to  show  that  \  have 
spared  no  pains  nor  expense  to  accomplish  the  great 
end  of  stopping  and  curing  obesity. 


BANTING    ON    CORPULENCE.  •) 

I  am  now  nearly  66  years  of  age,  aboul  5  Peel  5 
inches  in  stature,  and  in  Augusl  lasl  (1862),  weighed 
202  His.,  which  I  think  it  right  to  name,  because  the 
article  in  the  CornhiU  Magazim  presumes  thai  a  certain 
.stature  and  age  should  bear  ordinarily  a  certain  weight, 
and  I  am  quite  of  that  opinion.  I  now  weigh  167  lbs., 
showing  a  diminution  of  something  like  lib.  per  week 
since  August,  and  having  now  very  nearly  attained  the 
happy  medium,  I  have  perfect  confidence  that  a  few 
more  weeks  will  fully  accomplish  the  object  for  which 
I  have  labored  for  the  last  thirty  years,  in  vain,  until 
it  pleased  Almighty  Providence  to  direct  me  into  the 
right  and  proper  channel  —  the  "tramway."  so  to 
speak — of  happy,  comfortable  existence. 

Few  men  have  led  a  more  active  life — bodily  or 
mentally — from  a  constitutional  anxiety  for  regularity, 
precision,  and  order,  during  fifty  years' business  career, 
from  which  I  have  now  retired,  so  that  my  corpulence 
and  subsequent  obesity  was  not  through  neglecl  of 
necessary  bodily  activity,  nor  from  excessive  eating, 
drinking,  or  self-indulgence  of  any  kind,  except  that  I 
partook  of  the  simple  aliments  of  bread,  milk,  butter, 
heei'.  sugar,  and  potatoes  more  freely  than  my  aged 
nature  required,  and  hence,  as  1  believe,  tin'  genera- 
tion of  the  parasite,  detrimental  to  comfort,  if  not  really 

to  health. 

I  will  not  presume  to  descant  on  the  bodihj  struc- 
tural tissues,  so  fully  canvassed  in  the  CornhiU  Maga- 
zine, nor  how  they  are  supported  and  renovated,  having 
no  mind  or  power  to  enter  into  those  questions,  which 
properly  belong  to  the  wise  heads  of  the  faculty. 
None  of  my  family  on  the  side  of  either  parent  had  any 
tendency  to  corpulence,  and  from  my  earliesl  year.-  I  had 
an  inexpressible  dread  of  Buch  a  calamity,  so,  when   I 


6  BANTING    ON    CORPULENCE. 

was  between  thirty  and  forty  years  of  age,  finding  a 
tendency  to  it  creeping  upon  me,  I  consulted  an  emi- 
nent surgeon,  now  long  deceased — a  kind  personal 
friend — who  recommended  increased  bodily  exertion 
before  my  ordinary  daily  labors  began,  and  thought 
rowing  an  excellent  plan.  I  had  the  command  of  a 
good,  heavy,  safe  boat,  lived  near  the  river,  and 
adopted  it  for  a  couple  of  hours  in  the  early  morning. 
It  is  true  I  gained  muscular  vigor,  but  with  it  a 
prodigious  appetite,  which  I  was  compelled  to  indulge, 
and  consequently  increased  in  weight,  until  my  kind 
old  friend  advised  me  to  forsake  the  exercise. 

He  soon  afterwards  died,  and,  as  the  tendency  to 
corpulence  remained,  I  consulted  other  high  orthodox 
authorities  (never  any  inferior  adviser),  but  all  in  vain. 
I  have  tried  sea  air  and  bathing  in  various  localities, 
with  much  walking  exercise  ;  taken  gallons  of  physic 
and  liquor  potassae,  advisedly  and  abundantly  ;  riding 
on  horseback  ;  the  waters  and  climate  of  Leamington 
many  times,  as  well  as  those  of  Cheltenham  and  Har- 
rogate frequently  ;  have  lived  upon  sixpence  a  day,  so 
to  speak,  and  earned  it,  if  bodily  labor  may  be  so 
construed  ;  and  have  spared  no  trouble  nor  expense  in 
consultations  with  the  best  authorities  in  the  land, 
giving  each  and  all  a  fair  time  for  experiment,  without 
any  permanent  remedy,  as  the  evil  still  gradually 
increased. 

I  am  under  obligations  to  most  of  those  advisers  for 
tin'  pains  and  interest  they  took  in  my  case  ;  but  only 
to  one  for  an  effectual  remedy. 

When  a  corpulent  man  eats,  drinks,  and  sleeps 
well,  has  no  pain  to  complain  of,  and  no  particular 
organic  disease,  the  judgment  of  able  men  seems  paral- 
yzed— for  I  have   been  generally  informed  that  corpu- 


BANTING   ON   CORPULENCE.  7 

lence  is  one  of  the  natural  results  of  increasing  years  ; 
indeed,  one  of  the  ablest  authorities  as  a  physician  in 
the  land  told  me  he  had  gained  1  lb.  in  weighl  every 

year  since  he  attained  manhood,  and  was  not  surprised 
at  my  condition,  but  advised  more  bodily  exercise — 
vapor-baths  and  shampooing,  in  addition  to  the  medi- 
cine given.  Yet  the  evil  still  increased,  and,  like  the 
parasite  of  barnacles  on  a  ship,  if  it  did  not  destroy 
the  structure,  it  obstructed  its  fair,  comfortable  pro- 
gress in  the  path  of  life. 

I  have  been  in  dock,  perhaps  twenty  times  in  as 
many  years,  for  the  reduction  of  this  disease,  and  with 
little  good  effect — none  lasting.  Any  one  so  afflicted 
is  often  subject  to  public  remark,  and  though  in  con- 
science he  may  care  little  about  it,  1  am  confident  no 
man  laboring  under  obesity  can  be  quite  insensible  to 
the  sneers  and  remarks  of  the  cruel  and  injudicious  in 
public  assemblies,  public  vehicles,  or  the  ordinary 
street  traffic  ;  nor  to  the  annoyance  of  finding  no  ade- 
quate space  in  a  public  assembly  if  he  should  seek 
amusement  or  need  refreshment,  and  therefore  he 
naturally  keeps  away  as  much  as  possible  from  places 
where  he  is  likely  to  be  made  the  object  of  the  taunts 
and  remarks  of  others.  I  am  as  regardless  of  public 
remark  as  most  men,  but  I  have  felt  these  difficulties 
and  therefore  avoided  such  circumscribed  accommoda- 
tion and  notice,  and  by  that  means  have  been  deprived 
of  many  advantages  to  health  and  comfort. 

Although  no  very  great  size  or  weight,  still  I  could 
not  stoop  to  tic  my  shoe,  so  to  speak,  nor  attend  to 
the  little  offices  humanity  requires,  without  considera- 
ble pain  and  difficulty,  which  only  the  corpulent  can 
understand  ;  I  have  been  compelled  to  go  down  stairs 
slowly  backwards,  to  save  the  jar  of  increased  weight 


ib  BANTING    OX    CORPULENCE. 

upon  the  ancle  and  knee-joints,  and  been  obliged  to 
puff  and  blow  with  every  slight  exertion,  particularly 
that  of  going  up  stairs.  I  have  spared  no  pains  to 
remedy  this  by  low  living  (moderation  and  light  food 

was  generally  prescribed,  but  I  had  no  direct  bill  of 
fare  to  know  what  was  really  intended),  and  that,  con- 
sequently, brought  the  system  into  a  low,  impover- 
ished state,  without  decreasing  corpulence,  caused  many 
obnoxious  boils  to  appear,  and  two  rather  formidable 
carbuncles,  for  which  I  was  ably  operated  upon  and  fed 
into  increased  obesity. 

At  this  juncture  (about  three  years  back)  Turkish 
baths  became  the  fashion,  and  I  was  advised  to  adopt 
them  as  a  remedy.  With  the  first  few  I  found  im- 
mense benefit  in  power  and  elasticity  for  walking- 
exercise  ;  so,  believing  I  had  found  the  "philosopher's 
stone,"  pursued  them  three  times  a  week  till  I  had 
taken  fifty,  then  less  frequently  (as  I  began  to  fancy, 
with  some  reason,  that  so  man}'  weakened  my  consti- 
tution) till  I  had  taken  ninety,  but  never  succeeded  in 
losing  more  than  6  lbs.  weight  during  the  whole  course, 
and  1  gave  up  the  plan  as  worthless  ;  though  I  have 
full  belief  in  their  cleansing  properties,  and  their  value 
in  colds,  rheumatism,  and  many  other  ailments. 

I  then  fancied  increasing  obesity  materially  affected 
a  slight  umbilical  rupture,  if  it  did  not  cause  it,  and 
that  another  bodily  ailment  to  which  I  had  been  sub- 
ject was  also  augmented.  This  led  me  to  other  med- 
ical advisers,  to  whom  I  am  also  indebted  for  much 
kind  consideration,  though,  unfortunately,  they  failed 
in  relieving  me.  At  last  finding  my  sight  failing  and 
my  hearing  greatly  impaired,  1  consulted  in  August 
last  an  eminent  aural  surgeon,  who  made  light  of  the 
case,   looked  into   my  ears,  sponged   them   internally, 


BANTING    OX   CORPULENCE.  !> 

and  blistered  the  outside,  without  the  slightest  benefit, 
neither  inquiring  into  any  of  my  bodily  ailments,  which 
he  probably  thought  unnecessary,  nor  affording  me 
even  time  to  name  them. 

I  was  not  at  all  satisfied,  but  on  the  contrary,  was 
in  a  worse  plight  than  when  I  went  to  him  :  however, 
he  soon  after  left  town  tor  his  annual  holiday,  which 
proved  the  greatest  possible  blessing  to  me,  because  it 
compelled  me  to  seek  other  assistance,  ami.  happily,  1 
found  the  right  man.  who  unhesitatingly  said  he  be- 
lieved my  ailments  were  caused  principally  by  corpu- 
lence, and  prescribed  a  certain  diet,  no  medicine, 
beyond  a  morning  cordial  as  a  corrective.  —  with 
immense  effect  and  advantage  both  to  my  hearing  and 
the  decrease  of  my  corpulency. 

For  the  sake  of  argument  and  illustration  I  will  pre- 
sume that  certain  articles  of  ordinary  diet,  however  ben- 
eficial in  youth,  are  prejudicial  in  advanced  life,  like 
beans  to  a  horse,  whose  common  ordinary  food  is  hay 
and  corn.  It  may  be  useful  food  occasionally,  under 
peculiar  circumstances,  but  detrimental  as  a  constancy. 

I  will,  therefore,  adopt  the  analogy,  and  call  such  food 
human  beans.  The  items  from  which  I  was  advised 
to  abstain  as  much  as  possible  were: — Bread,  butter. 
milk,  sugar,  beer  and  potatoes,  which  had  been  the 
main  (and  I  thought  innocent)  elements  of  my  exist- 
ence, or,  al  all  events,  they  had  for  many  years  been 
adopted  freely. 

These  said  my  excellent  adviser,  contain  starch 
and  saccharine  matter,  tending  to  create  fat,  and  should 
be  avoided  altogether.  At  the  first  blush  it  seemed 
to  me  that  I  had  little  left  to  live  upon,  but  my  kind 
friend  soon  showed  me  there  was  ample,  ami  1  was 
only  too  happy  to  give  the  plan  a  fair  trial,  and  within 


10  BANTING   OX   CORPULENCE. 

a  very  few  days,  found  immense  benefit  from  it.  It 
may  Letter  elucidate  the  dietary  plan  if  I  describe 
generally  what  I  have  sanction  to  take,  and  that  man 
must  lie  an  extraordinary  person  who  would  desire  a 
better  table:  — 

For  breakfast,  I  take  four  or  five  ounces  of  beef, 
mutton,  kidneys,  broiled  fish,  bacon,  or  cold 
meat  of  any  kind  except  pork  ;  a  large  cup  of 
tea  (without  milk  or  sugar),  a  little  biscuit,  or 
one  ounce  of  dry  toast. 
For  dinner,  Five  or  six  ounces  of  any  fish  except 
salmon,  any  meat  except  pork,  any  vegetable 
excej^t  potato,  one  ounce  of  dry  toast,  fruit  out 
of  a  pudding,  any  kind  of  poultry  or  game, 
and  two  or  three  glasses  of  good  claret,  sherry, 
or  Madeira — Champagne,  Port  and  Beer  for- 
bidden. 
For  tea,  two  or  three  ounces  of  fruit,  a  rusk  or 

two,  and  a  cup  of  tea  without  milk  or  sugar. 
For  supper,  Three  or  four  ounces  of  meat  or  fish 
similar  to  dinner,  with  a  glass  or  two  of  claret. 
For  nightcap,  if  required,   a  tumbler  of  grog — 
(gin,  whisky  or  brandy,  without  sugar) — or  a 
glass  or  two  of  claret  or  sherry. 
This  plan  leads  to  an  excellent  night's  rest,   with 
from  six  to  eight  hours'  sound  sleep.     The  dry  toast 
or  rusk  may  have  a  table  spoonful  of  spirit  to  soften 
it,   which  will   prove   acceptable.      Perhaps  I   did  not 
wholly  escape  starchy  or  saccharine  matter,  but  scru- 
pulously   avoided   those   beans,   such   as  milk,   sugar, 
beer,  butter,  &c,  which  were  known  to  contain  them. 
Ou  rising  in   the  morning  1  take  a  table  spoonful 
of  a  special  corrective  cordial,  which  may  be  called  the 


CANTING    ON    CORPULENCE.  11 

Balm  of  Life,  in  a  wine-glass  of  water,  a  most  grateful 
draught,  as  it  seems  to  carry  away  all  the  dregs  left 

in  the  Stomach  after  digestion,  but  is  not  aperient  ; 
then  I  take  about  5  or  6  ounces  solid  and  8  of  liquid 
for  breakfast  ;  8  ounces  of  solid  and  8  of  liquid  for 
dinner;  3  ounces  of  solid  and  8  of  liquid  for  tea  ; 
4  ounces  of  solid  and  6  of  liquid  for  Slipper,  and  the 
grog  afterwards,  if  I  please.  1  am  not,  however, 
strictly  limited  to  any  quantity  at  either  meal,  so  that 
the  nature  of  the  food  is  rigidly  adhered  to. 

Experience  has  taught  me  to  believe'  that  these 
human  beans  are  the  most  insidious  enemies  man, 
with  a  tendency  to  corpulence  in  advanced  life,  can 
possess,  though  Eminently  friendly  to  youth.  He  may 
very  prudently  mount  guard  against  such  an  enemy  if 
he  is  not  a  fool  to  himself;  and  I  fervently  hope  this 
truthful  unvarnished  tale  may  lead  him  to  make  a 
trial  of  my  plan,  which  I  sincerely  recommend  to 
public  notice. — not  with  any  ambitious  motive,  but  in 
sincere  good  faith  to  help  my  fellow-creatures  to  ob- 
tain the  marvellous  blessings  I  have  found  within  the 
short  period  of  a  few  months. 

I  do  not  recommend  every  corpulent  man  to  rush 
headlong  into  such  a  change  of  diet,  (certainly  not), 
but  to  act  advisedly  and  after  full  consultation  with  a 
physician. 

My  former  dietary  table  was  bread  and  milk  for 
breakfast,  or  a  pint  of  tea  with  plenty  of  milk  and 
sugar,  and  buttered  toast ;  meat,  beer,  much  bread 
(of  which  I  was  always  very  fond)  and  pastry  for 
dinner,  the  meal  of  tea  similar  to  that  of  breakfast, 
and  generally  a  fruit  tart  or  bread  and  milk  for -up- 
per.     I  had  little  comfort  and  far  less  sound  sleep. 

It  certainly  appears  to  me  that  my  present  dietary 


12  BANTING    ON   CORPULENCE. 

table  is  far  superior  to  the  former — more  luxurious 
and  liberal,  independent  of  its  blessed  effect — but 
when  it  is  proved  to  be  more  healthful,  comparisons 

are  simply  ridiculous,  and  I  can  hardly  imagine  any 
man.  even  in  sound  health,  would  choose  the  former, 
even  if  it  were  not  an  enemy  ;  but,  when  it  is  shown 
to  be,  as  in  my  case,  inimical  both  to  health  and  com- 
fort, I  can  hardly  conceive  there  is  any  man  who 
would  not  willingly  avoid  it.  I  can  conscientiously 
assert  I  never  lived  so  well  as  under  the  new  plan  of 
dietary,  which  I  should  have  formerly  thought  a  dan- 
gerous extravagant  trespass  upon  health  ;  I  am  very 
much  better,  bodily  and  mentally,  and  pleased  to  be- 
lieve that  I  hold  the  reins  of  health  and  comfort  in 
my  own  hands,  and,  though  at  sixty-live  years  of  age, 
I  cannot  expect  to  remain  free  from  some  coming 
natural  infirmity  that  all  flesh  is  heir  to,  I  cannot  at 
the  present  time  complain  of  one.  It  is  simply  mirac- 
ulous, and  I  am  thankful  to  Almighty  Providence  for 
directing  me,  through  an  extraordinary  change,  to  the 
care  of  a  man  who  could  work  such  a  chance  in  so 
short  a  time. 

Oh!  that  the  faculty  would  look  deeper  into  and 
make  themselves  better  acquainted  with  the  crying  evil 
of  obesity — that  dreadful  tormenting  parasite  on  health 
and  comfort.  Their  fellow  men  might  not  descend  into 
early  premature  graves,  as  I  believe  many  do,  from 
what  is  termed  apoplexy,  and  certainly  would  not, 
during  their  sojourn  on  earth,  endure  so  much  bodily 
and  consequently  mental  infirmity. 

Corpulence,  though  giving  no  actual  pain,  as  it 
appears  to  me,  must  naturally  press  with  undue  vio- 
lence upon  the  bodily  viscera,  driving  one  part  upon 
another,   and  stopping  the   free   action  of  all.     I  am 


BANTING    ON   CORPULENCE.  13 

sure  it  did  in  my  particular  case,  and  the  resuH  of  mj 
experience  is  briefly  as  follows  : 

I  have  not  felt  so  well  as  now  for  the  last  twenty 

years. 
Have  suffered  no  inconvenience  whatever  in  the 

probational  remedy. 
Am  reduced  many  inches  in  bulk,  and  351bs.  in 

weight  in  thirty-eight  weeks. 
Come  down  stairs  forward  naturally  with  perfecl 
ease. 
Go   up   stairs   and    take   ordinary   exercise    freely. 

without  the  slightest  inconvenience. 
Can  perform  every  necessary  office  tor  myself. 
The   umbilical  rupture  is  greatly  ameliorated,  ami 

gives  me  no  anxiety. 
My  sight  is  restored — my  hearing  improved. 
My  other  bodily  ailments  are  ameliorated  ;  indeed, 

almost  past  into  matter  of  history. 
I  have  placed  a  thank-offering  of  £50  in  the  hands 
of  my  kind  medical  adviser  for  distribution  amongst 
his  favorite  hospitale  aftei  gladh  paying  his  usual 
fees,  and  still  remain  under  overwhelming  obligations 
for  his  care  ami  attention,  which  I  can  never  hope  to 
repay.  Most  thankful  to  Almighty  Providence  for 
mercies  received,  and  determined  to  press  the  ease  in- 
to public  notice  as  a  token  of  gratitude. 

I  have  the  pleasure  to  afford,  in  conclusion,  a  sat- 
isfactory confirmation  of  my  report,  in  stating  that  a 
corpulenl  friend  of  mine,  who.  like  myself,  is  possessed 
of  a  generally  sound  constitution,  was  labouring  under 
frequent  palpitations  of  the  heart  ami  sensations  of 
fainting,  was.  at  my  instigation,  induced  to  place  him- 
self in  the  hands  of  my  medical  adviser,  with  the  same 
gradual  beneficial  results,      lie  is  at  present  under  the 


14  BANTING   ON   CORPULENCE. 

same  ordeal,  and  in  eight  weeks  has  profited  even 
more  largely  than  I  did  in  that  short  period  ;  he  has 
lost  the  palpitations,  and  is  becoming,  so  to  speak,  a 
new  made  man — thankful  to  me  for  advising,  and 
grateful  to  the  eminent  counsellor  to  whom  I  referred 
him — and  he  looks  forward  with  good  hope  to  a  per- 
fect cure. 

I  am  fully  persuaded  that  hundreds,  if  not  thous- 
ands, of  our  fellow  men  might  profit  equally  by  a  sim- 
ilar course  ;  but,  constitutions  not  being  all  alike,  a 
different  course  of  treatment  may  he  advisable  for  the 
removal  of  so  tormenting  an  affliction. 

My  kind  and  valued  medical  adviser  is  not  a  doctor 
for  obesity,  but  stands  on  the  pinnacle  of  fame  in  the 
treatment  of  another  malady,  which,  as  he  well  knows, 
is  frequently  induced  by  the  disease  of  which  I  am 
speaking,  and  I  most  sincerely  trust  most  of  my  cor- 
pulent friends  (and  there  are  thousands  of  corpulent 
people  whom  I  dare  not  so  rank)  may  be  led  into  my 
tramroad.  To  any  such  I  am  prepared  to  oiler  the 
further  key  of  knowledge  by  naming  the  man.  It 
might  seem  invidious  to  do  so  now,  but  I  shall  only  be 
too  happy,  if  applied  to  by  letter  in  good  faith,  or  if 
any  doubt  should  exist  as  to  the  correctness  of  this 
statement. 

WILLIAM  BANTING,  Sen., 

Late  of  No.  27  St.  James's  Sired.  Piccadilly, 
Note  of  No.  4,  The  Terrace,  Kensmgton. 
jVcuj,  18G3. 


.a.:di>e:m>^. 


Having  exhausted  the  first  Edition  (1,000  copies) 
of  the  foregoing  Pamphlet  ;  and  a  period  of  one  year 
having  elapsed  since  commencing  the  admirable  course 
of  diet  which  has  led  to  such  inestimably  beneficial 
results,  and,  "as  I  expected,  and  desired,''  having 
quite  succeeded  in  attaining  the  happy  medium  of 
weight  and  bulk  I  had  so  long  ineffectually  sought, 
which  appears  necessary  to  health  <i1  my  age  and  stature 
— I  feel  impelled  by  a  sense  of  public  duty,  to  offer 
the  result  of  my  experience  in  a  second  Edition.  It 
has  been  suggested  that  I  should  have  sold  the  Pam- 
phlet, devoting  any  profit  to  Charity  as  more  agree- 
able and  useful  ;  and  I  had  intended  to  adopt  such  a 
course,  but  on  reflection  feared  my  motives  might  be 
mistaken  :  I,  therefore,  respectfully  present  this  (like 
the  first  Edition)  to  the  Public  gratuitously,  earnestly 
hoping  the  subject  may  be  taken  up  by  medical  men 
and  thoroughly  ventilated. 

It  may  (and  I  hope  will)  be,  as  satisfactory  to  the 
public  to  hear,  as  it  is  for  me  to  state,  thai  the  first 
Edition  has  been  attended  with  very  comforting  results 
to  other  sufferers  from  Corpulence,  as  the  remedial 
system  therein  described  was  to  me  under  that  terrible 
disease,  which  was  my  main  object  in  publishing  my 
convictions  on  the  subject.  It  has  moreover  attained 
a  success,  produced  flattering  compliments,  and  an 
amount  of  attention  I  could  hardly  have  imagined  pos- 
sible.    The  pleasure  and  satisfaction  this  has  afforded 


1G  BANTING    OX   CORPULENCE. 

me,  is  ample  compensation  for  the  trouble  and  expense 
I  have  incurred,  and  I  most  sincerely  trust,  "as  I  ver- 
ily believe,"  this  second  Edition  will  be  accompanied 
by  similar  satisfactory  results  from  a  more  extensive 
circulation.  If  so,  it  will  inspirit  me  to  circulate  fur- 
ther Editions,  whilst  a  corpulent  person  exists,  requi- 
ring, as  I  think,  this  system  of  diet,  or  so  long  as  my 
motives  cannot  be  mistaken,  and  are  thankfully 
appreciated. 

My  weight  is  reduced  46B>s'.,  and  as  the  very  grad- 
ual reductions  which  I  am  able  to  show  may  lie  inter- 
esting to  many,  I  have  great  pleasure  in  stating  them, 
believing  they  serve  to  demonstrate  further  the  merit 
of  the  system  pursued. 

My  weight  on  26th  August.  1862,  was  202Ibs. 
lbs.  lbs. 

On  7th  September,  it  was  200,  having  lost  2 


27th 

'       197 

3  more 

19th  October 

1       193 

4     « 

9  th  November 

1       100 

3     " 

3rd  December 

'       187 

3     " 

24th 

'       184 

3     " 

14th  Jan.,  18G3 

1       182 

"         2     " 

4th  February 

'       180 

2     " 

25th 

'       178 

"         2     " 

18th  March 

'       17G 

2     " 

8th  April 

'       173 

3     " 

29th     " 

'       170 

3     " 

2iith  May 

1       1G7 

3     " 

10th  June 

'       1(54 

3     " 

1st  July 

'       161 

3     " 

22nd   ': 

'       159 

"         2     " 

12th  August 

'       157 

ii         2     " 

26th 

'       156 

1     " 

1  2th  September 

156 
ght 

0     " 

Total  loss  of  we 

.  .  .      4Glhs. 

BANTING    ON   CORPULENCE.  17 

My  girth  is  reduced  round  the  waist,  in  tailor 
phraseology,  12i  inches,  which  extent  was  hardly  con- 
ceivable even  by  my  own  friends,  or  my  respected 
medical  adviser,  until  J  put  on  my  former  clothing, 

over  what  I  now  wear,  which  was  a  thoroughly  con- 
vincing proof  of  the  remarkable  change.  These  im- 
portant desiderata  have  ]>een  attained  by  the  most  easy 
and  comfortable  means,  with  but  little  medicine,  and 

almost  entirely  by  a  system  of  diet,  that  formerly  1 
should  have  thought  dangerously  generous.  I  am  told 
by  all  who  know  me  that  my  persona]  appearance  is 
greatly  improved,  and  that  I  seem  to  bear  the  stamp 
of  good  health  ;  this  may  he  a  matter  of  opinion  or 
friendly  remark,  but  1  can  honestly  assert  that  1  feel 
restored  in  health,  "  bodily  and  mentally,"  appear  to 
have  more  muscular  power  and  vigour,  eat  and  drink 
with  a  good  appetite,  and  sleep  wed.  All  symptoms 
of  acidity,  indigestion,  and  heartburn,  (with  which  I 
was  frequently  tormented)  have  vanished.  1  have  left 
oil'  using  boot  hooks,  and  other  such  aids  which  were 
indispensible,  hut  being  now  aide  to  stoop  with  ease 
and  freedom,  are  unnecessary.  1  have  lost  the  feeling 
of  occasional  faintness,  and  what  I  think  a  remarkable 
blessing  and  comfort  is  that  I  have  been  able  safely  to 
leave  oil'  knee  bandages,  which  I  had  worn  necessarily 
for  20  past  years,  and  given  up  a  trussalmosl  entirely  ; 
indeed  1  believe  1  might  wholly  discard  it  with  safety, 
but  am  advised  to  wear  it  at  least  occasionally  for  the 
present. 

Since  publishing  my  Pamphlet,  I  have  felt  con- 
strained to  send  a  copy  of  it  to  my  former  medical 
advisers,  and  to  ascertain  their  opinions  on  the  subject. 
They  did  not  dispute  or  question  the  propriety  of  the 
system,  hut  either  dared  not  venture  its  practice  upon 


18  BANTING   ON   CORPULENCE. 

a  man  of  my  age,  or  thought  it  too  g;reat  a  sacrifice  of 
personal  comfort  to  be  generally  advised  or  adopted, 
and  I  fancy  none  of  them  appeared  to  feel  the  fact  of 
the  misery  of  corpulence.  One  eminent  physician,  as 
I  before  stated,  assured  me  that  increasing  weight  was 
a  necessary  result  of  advancing  years  ;  another  equally 
eminent,  to  whom  I  had  been  directed  by  a  very 
friendly  third,  who  had  most  kindly  but  ineffectually 
failed  in  a  remedy,  added  to  my  weight  in  a  few 
weeks  instead  of  abating  the  evil.  These  facts  lead 
me  to  believe  the  question  is  not  sufficiently  observed 
or  even  regarded. 

The  great  charm  and  comfort  of  the  system  is.  that 
its  effects  are  palpable  within  a  week  of  trial,  which 
creates  a  natural  stimulus  to  persevere  for  a  few  weeks 
more,  when  the  fact  becomes  established  beyond 
question. 

I  only  entreat  all  persons  suffering  from  corpulence 
to  make  a  fair  trial  for  just  one  clear  month,  as  I  am 
well  convinced  the}'  will  afterwards  pursue  a  course 
which  yields  such  extraordinary  benefit,  till  entirely 
and  effectually  relieved  ;  and  he  it  remembered,  by  the 
Sacrifice  merely  of  simple,  for  the  advantage  of  more 
generous  and  comforting  food.  The  simple  dietary 
evidently  adds  fuel  to  fire,  whereas  the  superior 
and  liberal  seems  to  extinguish  it. 

I  am  delighted  to  be  able  to  assert  that  I  have 
proved  the  great  merit  and  advantage  of  the  system  by 
its  result  in  several  other  cases,  similar  to  my  own,  and 
have  full  confidence  that  within  the  next  twelve  months 
I  shall  know  of  many  more  cases  restored  from  the 
disease  of  corpulence,  for  I  have  received  the  kindest 
possible  letters  from  many  afflicted  strangers  and 
friends,  as  well  as  similar  personal  observations  from 


BANTING    ON    CORPULEKCE.  L9 

others  whom  I  have  conversed  with,  and  assurances 
from  most  of  them  that  they  will  kindly  inform  me  the 
result  for  my  own  private  satisfaction.  Many  are  prac- 
ticing the  diet  alter  consultation  with  their  own  medical 

advisors  ;  some  few  have  gone  to  mine,  and  others  are 
practicing  upon  their  own  convictions  of  the  advantages 

detailed  in  the  Pamphlet,  though  I  recommend  all  to 
act  advisedly,  in  case  their  constitutions  should  differ. 
I  am,  however,  so  perfectly  satisfied  of  the  great  uner- 
ring benefits  of  this  system  of  diet,  that  I  shall  spare 
no  trouble  to  circulate  nvy  humble  experience.  The 
amount  and  character  of  my  correspondence  on  the 
subject  has  been  strange  and  singular,  hut  most  satis- 
factory to  my  mind  and  feelings. 

I  am  now  in  that  happy,  comfortable  state,  that  I 
should  not  hesitate  to  indulge  in  any  fancy  in  regard 
to  diet,  hut  if  1  did  so,  should  watch  the  consequences, 
and  not  continue  any  course  which  might  add  to  weight 
or  bulk  and  consequent  discomfort. 

Is  not  the  system  suggestive  to  artists  and  men  of 
sedentary  employment,  who  cannot  spare  time  for  ex- 
ercise, consequently  become  corpulent,  and  clog  the 
little  muscular  action  with  a  superabundance  of  fat. 
thus  easily  avoided  ? 

Pure  genuine  bread  may  be  the  stall'  of  life,  as  it 
is  termed.  It  is  so,  particularly  in  youth,  hut  I  feel 
certain  it  is  more  wholesome  in  advanced  life  if  thor- 
oughly toasted,  as  I  take  it.  My  impression  is,  thai 
any  starchy  or  saccharine  matter  tends  to  the  disease 
of  corpulence  in  advanced  life,  and  whether  it  he  swal- 
lowed in  that  form,  or  generated  in  the  stomach,  that 
all  things  tending  to  these  elements  should  he  avoided. 
of  course  always  under  sound  medical  authority. 

WILLIAM   BANTING 


*'  \ 


CONCLUDING  ADDENDA. 


It  is  very  satisfactory  to  me  to  be  .able  to  state, 
that  I  remained  at  the  same  standard  of  bulk  and 
weight  for  several  weeks  after  the  26th  August,  when 
I  attained  the  happy  natural  medium,  since  which 
time  I  have  varied  in  weight  from  two  to  three  pounds, 
more  or  less.  I  have  seldom  taken  the  morning 
draught  since  that  time,  and  have  frequently  indulged 
my  fancy,  experimentally,  in  using  milk,  sugar,  butter 
and  potatoes — indeed,  I  may  say,  all  the  forbidden 
articles,  except  leer,  in  moderation,  with  impunity,  but 
always  as  an  exception,  not  as  a  rule.  This  deviation, 
however,  convinces  me  that  I  hold  the  power  of  main- 
taining the  happy  medium  in  my  own  hands. 

A  kind  friend  has  lately  furnished  me  with  a  tabu- 
ular  statement  in  regard  to  weight  as  proportioned  to 
stature,  which,  under  present  circumstances  and  the 
new  movement,  may  be  interesting  and  useful  to  cor- 
pulent readers : — 

STATURE.  WEIGHT. 

5  feet  1  should  be  8  stone  8  or  120  lbs. 

5  "    2 

5  "    3 

5  "    4 

5  I;    5 

5  "    6 

5  "    7 

5  "    8 

5  "    9 

5  "  10 

5  "  11 

G  "    0 


9 

••    0  ' 

•  120 

9 

•'    7  ' 

'  133 

9 

'•  10  ' 

•  130 

10 

2  . 

'  142 

10 

5  ' 

•  i  r. 

10 

u     8  . 

■    1  IS 

11 

"     1   • 

■   155 

11 

•'     8  ' 

•   162 

12 

..     x   . 

■   169 

12 

■     6  ' 

•  174 

12 

"  10  • 

■   L78 

SI  BANTING    ON    CORPULENCE. 

This  tabular  statement,  taken  from  a  mean  average 
of  2,648  healthy  men,  was  formed  and  arranged  for 
an  Insurance  Company,  by  the  late  Dr.  John  Hutchin- 
son. It  answered  as  a  pretty  good  standard,  and  in- 
surances were  regulated  upon  it.  His  calculations 
were  made  upon  the  volume  of  air  passing  in  and  out 
of  the  lungs,  and  this  was  his  guide  as  to  how  far  the 
various  organs  of  the  body  were  in  health,  and  the 
lungs  in  particular.  It  may  be  viewed  as  some  sort  of 
probable  rule,  yet  only  as  an  average — some  in  health 
weighing  more  by  many  pounds  than  others.  It  must 
not  be  looked  upon  as  infallible,  but  only  as  a  sort  of 
general  reasonable  guide  to  Nature's  great  and  might}' 
work. 

On  a  general  view  of  the  question,  I  think  it  may 
be  conceded  that  a  frame  of  low  stature  was  hardly 
intended  to  bear  very  heavy  weight.  Judging  from 
this  tabular  statement  I  ought  to  be  considerably 
lighter  than  I  am  at  present  :  I  shall  not,  however, 
covet  or  aim  at  such  a  result,  nor,  on  the  other  hand, 
feel  alarmed  if  I  decrease  a  little  more  in  weight  and 
bulk. 

I  am  certainly  more  sensitive  to  cold  since  I  have 
lost  the  superabundant  fat ;  but  this  is  remcdible  by 
another  garment,  far  more  agreeable  and  satisfactory. 
Many  of  my  friends  have  said,  "Oh!  you  have  done 
well  so  far,  but  take  care  you  don't  go  too  far."  I 
fancy  such  a  circumstance,  with  such  a  dietary,  very 
unlikely,  if  not  impossible  ;  but  feeling  that  I  have  now 
nearly  attained  the  right  standard  of  bulk  and  weight 
proportional  to  my  stature  and  age  (between  10  and 
11  stone),  I  should  not  hesitate  to  partake  of  a  fattening 
dietary  occasionally,  to  preserve  that  happy  standard, 
if  necessary  ;  indeed,   I   am  allowed  to  do  so  by  my 


BANTING    ON    CORPULENCE.  23 

medical  adviser,  but  I  shall  always  observe  a  careful 

watch  upon  myself  to  discover  the  effect,  and  act  ac- 
cordingly, so  that,  if  I  choose  to  spend  a  day  or  two 
with  Dives,  so  to  speak,  I  must  not  forget  to  devote 
the  next  to  Lazarus. 

The  remedy  may  he  as  old  as  the  hills,  as  I  have 
since  been  told,  but  its  application  is  of  very  recent 
date  :  and  it  astonishes  me  that  such  a  light  should 
have  remained  so  long  unnoticed  and  hidden,  as  not  to 
afford  a  glimmer  to  my  anxious  mind  in  a  search  for  it 
during  the  last  twenty  years,  even  in  directions  where 
it  might  have  been  expected  to  he  known.  I  would 
rather  presume  it  is  a  new  light,  than  that  it  was  pur- 
posely hidden,  merely  because  the  disease  of  obesity 
was  not  immediately  dangerous  to  existence,  nor 
thought  to  lie  worthy  of  serious  consideration.  Little 
do  the  faculty  imagine  the  misery  and  bitterness  to 
life  through  the  parasite  of  corpulence  or  obesity. 

I  can  now  confidently  say  that  quantity  of  diet 
may  he  safely  left  to  the  natural  appetite  ;  and  that  it 
is  the  quality  only,  which  is  essential  to  abate  and  cure 
corpulence.  I  stated  the  quantities  of  my  own  dietary, 
because  it  was  part  of  a  truthful  report  ;  but  some  cor- 
respondents have  doubted  whether  it  should  lie  more 
or  less  in  their  own  cases,  a  doubt  which  would  be  bet- 
ter solved  by  their  own  appetite,  or  medical  adviser. 
I  have  heard  a  graphic  remark  by  a  corpulent  man, 
which  may  not  be  inappropriately  stated  here,  that  big 
houses  were  not  formed  with  scanty  materials.  This, 
however,  is  a  poor  excuse  for  self-indulgence  in  im- 
proper food,  or  for  not  consulting  medical  authority. 

The  approach  of  corpulence  is  SO  gradual  that,  un- 
til it  is  far  advanced,  persons  rarely  become  objects  of 
attention.      Many  may  have  even  congratulated  them- 


24  BAXTIXG    ON    CORPULENCE. 

selves  on  their  comely  appearance,  and  have  not  sought 
advice  or  a  remedy  for  what  they  did  not  consider  an 
evil,  for  an  evil  I  can  say  most  truly  it  is,  when  in 
much  excess,  to  which  point  it  must,  in  my  opinion 
arrive,  unless  obviated  by  proper  means. 

Many  have  wished  to  know  (as  future  readers  may) 
the  nature  of  the  morning  draught,  or  where  it  could 
he  obtained,  but  believing  it  would  have  been  highly 
imprudent  on  my  part  to  have  presumed  that  what 
was  proper  for  my  constitution  was  applicable  to  atf 
indiscriminately,  I  could  only  refer  them  to  a  medical 
adviser  for  any  aid  beyond  the  dietary  ;  assuring  them 
however,  it  was  not  a  dram  but  of  an  alkaline  character. 

Some,  I  believe,  would  willingly  submit  to  even  a 
violent  remedy,  so  that  an  immediate  benefit  could  be 
produced  ;  this  is  not  the  object  of  the  treatment,  as  it 
cannot  but  be  dangerous,  in  my  humble  opinion,  to 
reduce  a  disease  of  this  nature  suddenly  ;  they  are 
probably  then  too  prone  to  despair  of  success,  ami 
consider  it  as  unalterably  connected  with  their  consti- 
tution. Many  under  this  feeling  doubtless  return  to 
their  former  habits,  encouraged  so  to  act  by  the  ill- 
judged  advice  of  friends  who,  I  am  persuaded  (from 
the  correspondence  I  have  had  on  this  most  interesting 
subject)  become  unthinking  accomplices  in  the  destruc- 
tion of  those  whom  they  regard  and  esteem. 

The  question  of  four  meals  a-dav,  and  the  night 
cap,  has  been  abundantly  and  amusingly  criticized. 
I  ought  perhaps  to  have  stated  as  an  excuse  for  such 
liberality  of  diet,  that  I  breakfast  between  eight  and 
nine  o'clock,  dine  between  one  and  two.  take  my  slight 
tea  meal  between  live  and  six,  sup  at  nine,  and  only 
take  the  night-cap  when  inclination  directs.  My  object 
in  naming  it  at  all  was,  that,  as  a  part  of  a  whole  s}-s- 


BANTING   ON   CORPULENCE.  25 

tern,  it  should  be  known,  and  to  show  it  is  not  forbid- 
den to  those  who  are  advised  that  they  need  Buch  a 

luxury  ;  nor  was  it  injurious  in  my  case.     Some  have 

inquired  whether  smoking  was  prohibited.  It  was 
not. 

It  lias  also  keen  remarked  that  such  a  dietary  as 
mine  was  too  good  and  expensive  for  a  poor  man.  ami 
that  I  had  wholly  lost  sight  of  that  class  ;  but  a  very 
poor  corpulent  man  is  not  so  frequently  met  with,  in- 
asmuch as  the  poor  cannot  afford  the  simple  inexpen- 
sive means  tor  creating  tat  ;  hut  when  the  tendency 
does  exist  in  that  class,  I  have  no  doubt  it  can  he 
remedied  by  abstinence  from  the  forbidden  articles, 
and  a  moderate  indulgence  in  such  cheap  stimulants  as 
may  be  recommended  by  a  medical  adviser,  whom  they 
have  ample  chances  of  consulting  gratuitously. 

I  have  a  very  strong  feeling  that  gout  (another 
terrible  parasite  upon  humanity)  might  he  greatly 
relieved,  if  not  cured  entirely,  by  this  proper  natural 
dietary,  and  sincerely  hope  some  person  so  afflicted 
may  he  induced  to  practice  the  harmless  plan  for  three 
months  (as  I  certainly  would  if  the  case  were  my  own) 
to  prove  it  ;  but  not  without  advice. 

My  impression  from  the  experiments  I  have  tried 
on  myself  of  late  is,  that  saccharine  matter  is  the  great 
moving  cause  of  fatty  corpulence.  I  know  that  it  pro- 
duces in  my  individual  case  increased  weight  and  a, 
large  amount  of  flatulence,  and  believe,  that  not  only 
sugar,  hut  all  elements  tending  to  create  saccharine 
matter  in  the  process  of  digestion,  should  lie  avoided. 
I  apprehend  it  will  he  found  in  bread,  butter,  milk. 
beer,  Port  wine,  and  Champagne  ;  I  have  not  found 
starchy  matter  so  troublesome  as  the  saccharine,  which 
I   think,   largely  increases  acidity   as   well   as  fat,  hut, 


26  BANTING   ON   CORPULENCE. 

with  ordinary  care  and  observation,  people  will  soon 
find  what  food  rests  easiest  in  the  stomach,  and  avoid 
that  which  does  not,  during  the  probationary  trial  of 
the  proposed  dietary.     Vegetables  and  ripe  or  stewed 

fruit  I  have  found  ample  aperients.  Failing  this,  med- 
ical advice  should  be  sought. 

The  word  "parasite"  has  been  much  commented 
upon,  as  inappropriate  to  any  but  a  living  creeping 
thing  (of  course  I  use  the  word  in  a  figurative  sense. 
as  a  burden  to  the  flesh),  hut  if  fat  is  not  an  insidious 
creeping  enemy,  I  do  not  know  what  is.  .1  should  have 
equally  applied  the  word  to  gout,  rheumatism,  dropsy. 
and  many  other  diseases. 

Whereas  hitherto  the  appeals  to  me  to  know  the 
name  of  my  medical  adviser  have  been  very  numerous, 
I  may  say  hundreds,  which  I  have  gladly  answered, 
though  forming  no  small  item  of  the  expense  incurred, 
and  whereas  the  very  extensive  circulation  expected 
of  the  third  edition  is  likely  to  lead  to  some  thousands 
of  similar  applications,  I  feel  hound,  in  self-defence,  to 
state  that  the  medical  gentleman  to  whom  I  am  so 
deeply  indebted  is  Mr.  Harvey,  Soho  Square,  London, 
whom  1  consulted  for  deafness.  In  the  first  and  second 
editions,  I  thought  that  to  give  his  name  would  appear 
like  a  puff,  which  I  know  he  abhors  ;  indeed,  I  should 
prefer  not  to  do  so  now,  but  cannot,  in  justice  to  my- 
self, incur  further  probable  expense  (which  I  fancy 
inevitable)  besides  the  personal  trouble,  for  which  I 
cannot  afford  time,  and,  therefore,  feel  no  hesitation  to 
refer  to  him  as  my  guarantee  for  the  truth  of  the 
pamphlet. 

One  material  point  I  should  be  glad  to  impress  on 
my  corpulent  readers — it  is,  to  get  accurately  weighed 
at  starting  upon  the  fresh  system,  and  continue  to  do 


BANTING   ON   CORPULENCE.  2, 

so  weekly  or  monthly,  for  the  change  will  be  so  truly 
palpable  by  this  course  of  examination,  thai  it  will  arm 
them  with  perfect  confidence  in  the  merit  and  ultimate 
success  of  the  plan.  1  deeply  regret  not  having  secured 
a  photographic  portrait  of  my  original  figure  in  1862, 
to  plaee  in  juxta-position  with  one  of  my  present  form. 
It  might  have  amused  some,  but  certainly  would  have 
been  very  convincing  to  others,  and  astonishing-  to  all 
that  such  an  effect  should  have  been  so  readily  and 
speedily  produced  by  the  simple  natural  cause  of  ex- 
changing a  meagre  for  a  generous  dietary  under  pro- 
per advice. 

I  shall  ever  esteem  it  a  great  favour  if  persons  re- 
lieved and  cured,  as  I  have  been,  will  kindly  let  me 
know  of  it  ;  the  information  will  be  truly  gratifying  to 
my  mind.  That  the  system  is  a  great  success,  I  have 
not  a  shadow  of  doubt  from  the  numerous  reports  sent 
with  thanks  by  strangers  as  well  as  friends  from  all 
parts  of  the  kingdom  ;  and  I  am  truly  thankful  to  have 
been  the  humble  instrument  of  disseminating  the  bles- 
sing and  experience  I  have  attained  through  able 
counsel  and  natural  causes  by  proper  perseverance. 

I  have  now  finished  my  task,  and  trust  my  humble 
efforts  may  prove  to  be  good  seed  well  sown,  that  will 
fructify  and  produce  a  large  harvest  of  benefit  to  my 
fellow  creatures.  I  also  hope  the  faculty  generally 
may  be  led  more  extensively  to  ventilate  this  question 
of  corpulence  or  obesity,  so  that,  instead  of  one,  two, 
or  three  able  practitioners,  there  may  be  as  many  hun- 
dreds distributed  in  the  various  parts  of  the  United 
Kingdom.  In  such  case,  I  am  persuaded,  that  those 
diseases,  like  Reverence  and  Golden  Pippins,  will  be 
very  rare. 


Library. 

BANTING  ON  CORPULENCE. 


Review  from  Blackwood's  Magazine, 


Of  all  the  salutations  that  ever  were  devised  to 
express  hearty  good-will  and  large  substantial  friend- 
ship, recommend  us  to  that  of  the  Orientals:  "May 
your  shadow  never  bo  less!"  Maceration,  as  a  rule 
of  life,  is  suitable  only  for  hermits,  anchorites,  and 
such  like  recluses,  who  have  faith  in  the  efficacy  of 
parched  pease,  and  whose  typo  of  beatitude  is  the 
scarecrow.  Orthodoxy  is  allied  to  plumpness,  and  a 
certain  breadth  of  beam  is  most  becoming  to  a  high 
dignitary  of  the  church.  In  the  man  of  portly  pres- 
ence we  expect  to  find — and  rarely  indeed  are  wo  dis- 
appointed in  our  expectations — a  warm  heart,  a  kindly 
benevolent  disposition,  comprehensive  charity,  and  a 
conscience  void  of  offence.  We  fool  that  in  such  a 
man  we  can  repose  implicit  trust, — we  can  make  him 
the  depositary  of  our  secrets  without  fear  of  betrayal, 
— we  can  depend  upon  his  good  offices  when  we  need 
the  assistance  of  a  friend.  Very  difterent  arc  our  sen- 
sations when  wo  chance  to  encounter  a  gaunt  herring- 
gutted  individual  of  the  human  species,  who.  like  the 
evil  kine  seen  by  royal  Pharaoh  in  his  dream,  will  not 
fatten  upon  the  fairest  pasture.  His  sharp  looks  and 
low-set  hungry  jaw  instinctively  beget  distrust.     \\<- 


30  BANTING   ON    COBPOXENCE. 

has  the  eye  of  a  usurer,  the  yawn  of  an  ogre,  the  gripe 
of  a  bailiff  ;  and  being  utterly  destitute  of  bowels,  he 
yearns  not  for  the  calamities  of  his  kind.  Shrewd 
was  the  observation  of  Caesar, — 

"  Let  me  have  men  about  me  that  arc  fat  ; 
Sleek-headed  men,  and  such  as  sleep  o'  night. 
Yon  Cassius  hath  a  lean  and  hungry  look  ; 
I  like  him  not, — such  men  are  dangerous." 

Julius,  who  was  in  perfect  training,  and  did  not  weigh 
a  single  pound  more  than  the  standard  of  his  height 
would  justify,  saw  the  danger  and  would  have  pre- 
vented it.  His  keen  eye  detected  the  conspirator  and 
assassin  under  the  unwholesome  skin  of  the  ascetic  ; 
but  Antony,  who  was  somewhat  pudding-headed,  and 
whom  a  liberal  diet  of  quails  and  venison  had  lulled 
into  a  chronic  habit  of  good-nature,  felt  no  suspicion, 
ami  even  tried  to  vindicate  the  character  of  the  lean- 
est villain  of  the  age. 

We,  therefore,  being  anxious  that  good  men  should 
abound,  have  a  kindly  feeling  for  the  corpulent.  It 
is  a  notable  fact  in  criminal  statistics  that  no  fat  man 
was  ever  convicted  of  the  crime  of  murder.  Stout 
people  are  not  revengeful  ;  nor,  as  a  general  rule,  are 
they  agitated  by  gusts  of  passion.  Few  murderers 
weigh  more  than  ten  stone.  There  are,  however, 
exceptions,  which  justify  us  in  assuming  eleven  as  the 
utmost  limit  of  the  sliding-scale,  but  beyond  that 
there  is  no  impulse  toward  homicide.  Seldom  has 
such  a  phenomenon  as  a  fat  housebreaker  been  paraded 
at  a  criminal  bar.  It  is  your  lean,  wiry  fellow  who 
works  with  the  skeleton-keys,  forces  himself  through 
closet-windows  which  seemingly  would  scarce  suffice 
for  the  entrance  of  the  necessary  cat,  steals  with  noise- 
less step  along  the  lobby  and  up  the  stairs,  glides  into 


BANTING   ON  CORPULENCE.  31 

the  chamber  sacred  for  more  than  half  acentury  to  the 

chaste  repose  of  the  gentle  Tabitha,  and  with  husky 
voice  and  the  exhibition  of*  an  enormous  carving  knife. 
commands  silence  on  pain  of  instant  death,  and  deli- 
very of  her  cash  and  jewels.  It  is  your  attenuated 
thief  who  insinuates  himself  under  beds,  skulks  behind 
counters,  dives  into  tills,  or  makes  prey  of  articles  of 
commerce  arrayed  at  shop-doors  for  the  temptation  of 
the  credulous  passenger.  A  corpulent  burglar  is  as 
much  out  of  place  and  as  little  to  be  feared  as  was 
Falstaff  at  Gadshill, — and  what  policeman  ever  yet 
gave  chase  to  a  depredator  as  bulky  as  a  bullock? 
Corpulence,  we  maintain,  is  the  outward  sign  not  only 
of  a  good  constitution,  but  of  inward  rectitude  and 
virtue. 

There  is.  however,  such  a  thing  as  over-cultiva- 
tion ;  and  we  should  be  sorry  if  any  one,  misled  by 
these  our  preliminary  remarks,  should  think  that  we 
are  attempting  to  elevate  pinguitude  to  the  rank  of  a  car- 
dinal virtue.  Men  are  not  pigs,  to  be  estimated  entirely 
by  the  standard  of  weight;  ami  though,  in  a  certain  sense. 
the  late  Daniel  Lambert  was  one  of  the  greatest  men 
that  ever  lived,  we  certainly  do  not  hold  him  forth  as 
a  suitable  example  for  imitation.  But  we  cannot  give 
in  to  the  theory  that  plumpness  is  a  positive  misfor- 
tune ;  and  we  are  decidedly  opposed  to  a  system  which 
proscribes  as  deleterious  and  unwholesome  such  arti- 
cles of  food  as  are  the  best  known  and  most  univer- 
sally accepted, — which  is  essentially  coarse  and  carni- 
vorous, and  though  possibly  well  adapted  for  the  train- 
ing of  a  brutal  gladiator,  is  in  every  respect  unfitting 
for  the  nutriment  of  a  reasonable  Christian. 

Seldom  has  fame  descended  with  such  amazing  ra- 
pidity upon  the  shoulders  of  any  man  as  upon  those  of 


32  BANTING    OX   CORPULENCE. 

Mr.  William  Banting,  late  of  No.  27  St.  James's  street, 
Piccadilly.  Little  more  than  a  year  ago  his  name  was 
unknown  beyond  the  limited  but  respectable  circle 
of  his  acquaintance  ;  now  it  has  become  a  household 
word,  and  the  doctrines  which  he  has  promulgated  in 
his  pamphlet  have  been  adopted  by  thousands  who 
acknowledge  him  as  their  instructor  and  guide. 
Though  not  professing  to  be  the  actual  discoverer  of 
a  dietetic  system  which  can  cure  or  at  least  prevent 
many  of  the  ills  to  which  flesh  is  heir,  he  claims  to  be 
its  first  intelligible  exponent  ;  and  as  he  uses  none  of 
the  exotic  terms  or  technical  phrases  with  which  med- 
ical men  so  commonly  enwrap  their  meaning  as  to 
render  it  utterly  obscure,  but  writes  in  plain,  homely 
English,  without  any  scientific  nomenclature,  he  has 
found  a  ready  and  numerous  audience.  In  vain  do 
members  of  the  faculty — not  unjustifiably  incensed  by 
the  accusations  levelled  at  their  order  by  this  intruder 
into  their  own  peculiar  walk — insist  that  there  is  no 
novelty  in  the  system,  though  its  application  may  be 
of  doubtful  expediency.  Mr.  Banting  replies  that  for 
thirty  years  and  upwards  he  has  been  in  search  of  a 
remedy  against  increasing  corpulence,  and  has  received 
no  salutary  counsel  from  any  physician  save  the  last, 
who  regulated  his  diet. 

"None  of  my  family,"  he  says,  "on  the  side 
of  either  parent  laid  any  tendency  to  corpulence, 
and  from  my  earliest  years  I  had  an  inexpressible 
dread  of  such  a  calamity,  so,  whe'n  I  was  between 
thirty  and  forty  years  of  age,  finding  a  tendency 
to  it  creeping  upon  me,  I  consulted  an  eminent 
surgeon,  now  long  deceased  —  a  kind  personal 
friend — who  recommended  increased  bodily  exertion 
before  my  ordinary  daily  labors  began,   and  thought 


BANTING    ON   CORPULENCE.  S3 

rowing  an  excellent  plan.  I  had  the  command  of  a 
good,  heavy,  safe  boat,  lived  near  the  river,  and 
adopted  it  for  a  couple  of  hours  in  the  early  morning. 
It  is  true  I  gained  muscular  vigor,  bul  with  it  a 
prodigious  appetite,  which  I  was  compelled  to  indulge, 
and  consequently  increase'd  in  weight,  until  my  kind 
old  friend  advised  me  to  forsake  the  exercise. 

"He  soon  afterwards  died,  and.  as  the  tendency  to 
corpulence  remained,  I  consulted  other  high  orthodox 
authorities  (never  any  inferior  adviser),  but  all  in  vain. 
I  have  tried  sea  air  and  bathing  in  various  localities, 
with  much  walking  exercise  ;  taken  gallons  of  physic 
and  liquor  potassae,  advisedly  and  abundantly  :  riding 
on  horseback  ;  the  waters  and  climate  of  Leamington 
many  times,  as  well  as  those  of  Cheltenham  and  Har- 
rogate frequently  ;  have  lived  upon  sixpence  a  day,  so 
to  speak,  and  earned  it,  if  bodily  labor  may  be  so 
construed  ;  and  have  spared  no  trouble  nor  expense  in 
consultations  with  the  best  authorities  in  the  land, 
giving  each  and  all  a  fair  time  for  experiment,  without 
any  permanent  remedy,  as  the  evil  still  gradually 
increased." 

This  is  no  doubt  a  sweeping  charge  against   the 

faculty  :  but  when  we  consider  it  minutely,  it  appears 
to  us  that  Mr.  Banting  is  somewhat  unreasonable  in 
his  complaints.  True,  he  was  possessed  with  a  morbid 
horror  for  corpulence,  and  was  vehemently  desirous  to 

get  rid  of  some  superfluous  flesh  which  seemed  to  lie 
rapidly  accumulating ;  but  we  arc  nowhere  told  that 
his  health  had  been  impaired  in  the  slightest  degree, 
— indeed,  the  following  passage  leads  us  to  the  direct 
opposite  conclusion  : — 

"When."  says  he,   "a  corpulent    man  eats,  drinks, 
and  sleeps  well,  has  no  pain  to  complain  of.  and  no  par- 
c 


34  BAXTIXG    ON    CORPULENCE. 

ticular  organic  disease,  the  judgment  of  able  men  seems 
paralyzed — for  I  have  been  generally  informed  that  cor- 
pulence is  one  of  the  natural  results  of  increasing  years  ; 
indeed,  one  of  the  ablest  authorities  as  a  physician  in 
the  land  told  me  he  had  gained  1  lb.  in  weight  every 
year  since  he  attained  manhood,  and  was  not  surprised 
at  my  condition,  but  advised  more  bodily  exercise — 
vapor-baths  and  shampooing,  in  addition  to  the  medi- 
cine given.  Yet  the  evil  still  increased,  and,  like  the 
parasite  of  barnacles  on  a  ship,  if  it  did  not  destroy 
the  structure,  it  obstructed  its  fair,  comfortable  pro- 
gress in  the  path  of  life." 

The  "obstruction"  to  which  Mr.  Banting  alludes 
seems  to  have  been  nothing  more  than  an  extreme  dis- 
like to  be  twitted  on  the  score  of  punchiness.  He  says, 
with  undeniable  truth,  that 

"Any  one  so  afflicted  is  often  subject  to  public 
remark,  and  though  in  conscience  he  may  care  little 
about  it,  I  am  confident  no  man  laboring  under  obesity 
can  be  quite  insensible  to  the  sneers  and  remarks  of 
the  cruel  and  injudicious  in  public  assemblies,  public 
vehicles,  or  the  ordinary  street  traffic  ;  nor  to  the  an- 
noyance of  finding  no  adecpiate  space  in  a  public 
assembly  if  he  should  seek  amusement  or  need  refresh- 
ment, and  therefore  he  naturally  keeps  away  as  much  as 
possible  from  places  where  he  is  likely  to  lie  made  the 
object  of  the  taunts  and  remarks  of  others.  I  am  as 
regardless  of  public  remark  as  most  men,  but  I  have 
felt  those  difficulties  and  therefore  avoided  such  cir- 
cumscribed accommodation  and  notice,  and  by  that 
means  have  been  deprived  of  many  advantages  to 
health  and  comfort." 

All  that  may  be  perfectly  true,  but  we  cannot  see 
how  it  justifies  his  accusation  of  the  doctors.     Because 


BANTING   OX   CORPULENCE.  35 

cabmen  ami  street-boys  make  impertinent  remarks 
about  stature — because  querulous  people  in  the  pit  of 
the  theatre  object  to  having  a  human  screen  interposed 
between  them  ami  the  spectacle — because  an  elderly 
gentleman  cannot  contrive  to  squeeze  himself  with 
comfort  into  an  opera  stall,  or  the  narrow  box  of  a 
chophouse — is  it  the  duty  of  a  physician  to  recommend 
such  stringent  measures  as  will  make  him  a  walking 
skeleton  ?  It  is  the  business  of  a  doctor  to  cure  disease, 
not  to  minister  to  personal  vanity  ;  and  if  Mr.  Banting 
ate,  drank,  and  slept  well,  and  was  affected  by  no  ac- 
tual complaint,  we  really  cannot  understand  why  he 
should  have  been  so  pertinacious  in  demanding-  medi- 
cal assistance.  We  are  acquainted  with  many  estima- 
ble persons  of  both  sexes,  turning  considerably  more 
than  fifteen  stone  in  the  scales — a  heavier  weight  than 
Mr.  Banting  has  ever  attained — whose  health  is  unex- 
ceptionable, and  who  would  laugh  to  scorn  the  idea 
of  applying  to  a  doctor  for  recipe  or  regimen  which 
might  have  the  effect  of  marring  their  developed  come- 
liness. What  right,  we  ask.  has  Mr.  Banting  to  brand 
obesity  as  one  of  the  most  '•distressing  parasites  that 
affect  humanity."  while,  by  his  own  confession,  he  1:  is 
never  reached  that  point  of  corporeal  bulk  which  is 
generally  regarded  as  seemly  and  suitable  to  bishops, 
deans,  mayors,  provosts,  aldermen,  bailies,  ami  even 
dowagers  of  high  degree?  We  deny  that  a  man 
weighing  but  a  trifle  above  fourteen  stone  is  entitl  d 
to  call  himself  obese.  It  may  be  that  such  a  one  is 
not  qualified  to  exhibit  himself  as  a  dancer  on  the  tight 
rope,  or  to  take  flying  leaps  in  the  character  of  Harle- 
quin ;  neither  should  we  be  inclined  to  give  the  odds 
in  his  favor  if  he  were  to  enter  himself  as  a  compi 
for  the  long  race  at  a  Highland  meeting.      Bui  gentle- 


36 


BANTING    ON    CoIilTLKNCi;. 


men  in  the  position  of  Mr.  Bunting,  who.  we  believe, 
has  retired  into  private  life  after  a  successful  business 
career,  are  not  expected  to  rival  Leotard,  or  to  pit 
themselves  in  athletic  contests  against  hairy-houghed 
Donald  of  the  Isles.  As  a  deer-stalker,  it  may  be  that 
he  would  not  win  distinction — for  it  is  hard  work  even 
for  light-weights  to  scramble  up  conies  or  crawl  on  their 
bellies  through  moss-hags  and  water-channels  for  hours, 
before  they  can  get  the  glimpse  of  an  antler, — but 
man)'  a  country  gentleman,  compared  with  whom  Mr. 
Banting  at  his  biggest  would  have  been  but  as  a  fatted 
calf  to  a  full-grown  bull,  can  take,  with  the  utmost 
case,  a  long  day's  exercise  through  stubble  and  turnips, 
and  bring  home  his  twenty  brace  of  partridges,  with  a 
due  complement  of  hares,  without  a  symptom  of  bodily 
fatigue.  Mr.  Banting  seems  to  labor  under  the  hallu- 
cination that  he  was  at  least  as  heavy  as  Falstaff;  we, 
on  the  contrary,  have  a  shrewd  suspicion  that  Hamlet 
would  have  beaten  him  in  the  scales. 

It  is,  of  course,  in  the  option  of  all  who  are  dissa- 
tisfied with  their  present  condition  to  essay  to  alter  it. 
Lean  men  may  wish  to  become  fatter,  and  fat  men  may 
wish  to  become  leaner  ;  but  so  long  as  their  health 
remains  unimpaired,  they  are  not  lit  subjects  for  the 
doctor.  We  have  no  doubt  that  the  eminent  profes- 
sional gentlemen  whom  Mr.  Banting  consulted  took 
that  view  of  the  matter  :  and  having  ascertained  that 
there  was  in  reality  no  disease  to  be  cured,  gave  him, 
by  way  of  humoring  a  slight  hypochondriac  affection, 
a  few  simple  precepts  for  the  maintenance  of  a  health 
which  in  reality  required  no  improvement.  Probably 
they  opined  that  the  burden  of  his  flesh wasno  greater 
than  he  could  bear  witli  ease  ;  and  certainly,  under 
the  circumstances,  there  was  no  call  upon  them  what- 


BANTING    ON    CORPULENCE.  37 

ever  to  treat  him  as  if  he  had  been  a  jockey,  under 
articles  to  ride  a  race  at  Newmarket,  whose  success  or 
failure  ought  depend  upon  the  exact  uumber  of  pounds 
which  he  should  weigh  when  getting  into  the  saddle. 

Excessive  corpulence,  we  freely  admit,  may  have 
its  inconveniences.  It  is,  as  Mr.  Banting  justly  re- 
marks, rather  a  serious  state  of  matters  when  a  man. 
by  reason  ot'  fatness,  cannot  stoop  to  tie  his  shoe,  "nor 
attend  to  the  little  offices  which  humanity  requires, 
without  considerable  pain  and  difficulty."  To  be 
"compelled  to  go  down  stairs  slowly  backwards"  is  an 
acrobatic  feat  which  no  one  save  an  expectanl  Lord 
Chamberlain  would  rare  to  practice  ;  and  it  is  not 
seemly,  and  must  he  a  disagreeable  thing,  "to  puff 
and  blow  with  every  exertion."  like  a  porpoise  in  a 
gale  of  wind.  But,  as  we  gather  from  the  pamphlet, 
these  distressing  symptoms  did  not  exhibit  themselves* 
until  very  recently,  whereas  Mr.  Banting  says  he  has 
been  soliciting  a  remedy  from  the  faculty  any  time 
during  the  last  thirty  years.  He  also  makes  constant 
reference  to  his  increasing  obesity  throughout  thai  pi  - 
riod  ;  therefore  we  arc  entitled  to  conclude  that  with 
advancing  years  he  acquired  additional  weight,  and  did 
not  arrive  at  the  climax  until  26th  August,  L862,when, 
as  he  informs  us.  his  weight  was  two  hundred  and  two 
pounds,  or  fourteen  stone  six.  That  is  not.  after  all,  a 
very  formidable  weight  for  an  elderly  gentleman  of 
sedentary  habits.  Tom  Johnson,  the  pugilist,  weighed 
fourteen  stone  when  he  entered  the  ring  againsl  and 
conquered  Isaac  Perrins,  of  Birmingham,  supposed  to 

he  the  most  powerful  man  in  England,  and  weighing 
seventeen    stone.      Xeat  weighed    fourteen    stone 

training  ;  and.  according  u<  the  best  of  our  recollection 
(for  we  have  mislaid  our  copy  of  "  Boxiana"),  Josh 


66  BANTING    ON    CORPULENCE. 

Hudson  was  considerably  heavier.  Tom  Cribb,  the 
champion  of  England,  weighed  sixteen  stone  before 
he  went  into  training  for  his  great  fight  with  Moli- 
neaux,  and  reduced  himself  in  live  weeks,  through 
physic  and  exercise,  to  fourteen  stone  nine.  By  dint 
of  sweating  and  severe  work,  he  came  to  thirteen  stone 
live,  which  was  ascertained  to  be  the  pitch  of  his  con- 
dition, as  he  could  not  reduce  further  without  weak- 
ening. Such  instances  go  far  to  prove  that,  even  when 
his  circumference  was  the  widest,  Mr.  Banting  had  no 
reason  to  complain  of  excessive  corpulency.  But  even 
if  he  had,  the  enlarging  process  was  a  gradual  one  ;  he 
had  been  complaining  of  obesity  for  thirty  years  ;  and 
if  we  suppose  that  he  gained  only  a  pound  and  a  half 
per  annum — which  is  a  very  low  rate  of  increase — he 
must  have  been  applying  to  the  doctors  for  remedies 
'against  corpulence  when  he  weighed  only  eleven  stone 
three — a  weight  which  most  men  of  thirty-five  years 
of  age  would  regard  as  natural  and  appropriate. 

We  have  thought  it  right  to  make  these  observa- 
tions, because  Mr.  Banting  has  chosen  to  insinuate  that 
medical  men  generally  are  so  ignorant  of  their  calling 
that  they  do  not  understand  the  evils  of  obesity,  or 
cannot  conquer  it  by  prescribing  the  proper  diet. 

"The  remedy,"  says  Mr.  Banting,  "may  be  as 
old  as  the  hills,  as  I  have  since  been  told,  but 
its  application  is  of  very  recent  date  ;  and  it  aston- 
ishes* me  that  such  a  light  should  have  remained 
so  long  unnoticed  and  hidden,  as  not  to  afford  a 
glimmer  to  my  anxious  mind  in  a  search  for  it 
during  the  last  twenty  years,  even  in  directions  where 
it  might  have  been  expected  to  be  known.  I  would 
rather  presume  it  is  a  new  light,  than  that  it  was  pur- 
posely hidden,  merely  because   the   disease  of  obesity 


BANTING   ON   CORPULENCE.  39 

was  not  immediately  dangerous  to  existence,  nor 
thought  to  be  worthy  of  serious  consideration.  Little 
do  the  faculty  imagine  the  misery  and  bitterness  to 
life  through  the  parasite  of  corpulence  or  obesity." 

Now,  let  US  steadfastly  survey  this  new  light,  which 

was  Hashed  on  the  astonished  eyes  of  Mr.  Banting  by 
the  last  practitioner  whom  he  consulted.  That  light 
— but  we  really  cannot  continue  the  metaphor  without 
making  a  botch  of  it,  so  let  us  have  recourse  to  simpler 
language,  and  give  Mr.  Banting's  account  of  the  dietary 
which  he  was  advised  to  follow,  and  the  reasons  assigned 
therefor. 

'•  For  the  sake  of  argument  and  illustration  I  will 
presume  that  certain  articles  of  ordinary  diet,  however 
beneficial  in  youth,  are  prejudicial  in  advanced  life,  like 
beans  to  a  horse,  whose  common  ordinary  food  is  hay 
and  corn.  It  may  lie  useful  food  occasionally,  under 
peculiar  circumstances,  but  detrimental  as  a  constancy. 
I  will,  therefore,  adopt  the  analogy,  and  call  such  food 
human  beans.  The  items  from  which  I  was  advised 
to  abstain  as  much  as  possible  were  : — Bread,  butter, 
milk,  sugar,  beer  and  potatoes,  which  hail  been  the 
main  (and  I  thought  innocent)  elements  of  my  exist- 
ence, or,  at  all  events,  they  had  for  many  years  been 
adopted  freely. 

"  These  said  my  excellent  adviser,  contain  starch 
and  saccharine  matter,  tending  to  create  fat,  ami  should 
be  avoided  altogether.  At  the  firsl  blush  it  seemed 
to  me  that  I  had  little  left  to  live  upon,  but  my  kind 
friend  soon  showed  me  there  was  ample,  and  I  was 
only  too  happy  to  give  the  plan  a  fair  trial,  and  within 
a  very  few  days,  found  immense  benefil  from  it.  It 
may  better  elucidate  the  dietary  plan  if  1  describe 
generally  what  I  have  sanction  to   take,  and  that  man 


1U  BANTING    ON    CORPULEXCE. 

must  be  an  extraordinary  person  who  would  desire  a 
better  table:  — 

"  For  breakfast,  I  take  four  or  five  ounces  of  beef, 
mutton,  kidneys,  broiled  fish,  bacon,  or  cold 
meat  of  any  kind  except  pork  :  a  large  cup  of 
tea  (without  milk  or  sugar),  a  little  biscuit,  or 
one  ounce  of  dry  toast, 
"  For  dinner,  Five  or  six  ounces  of  any  fish  except 
salmon,  any  meat  except  pork,  any  vegetable 
except  potato,  one  ounce  of  dry  toast,  fruit  out 
of  a  pudding,  any  kind  of  poultry  or  game, 
ami  two  or  three  glasses  of  good  claret,  sherry, 
or  Madeira — Champagne,  Port  and  Beer  for- 
bidden. 
"For  tea.  Two  or  three  ounces  of  fruit,  a  rusk  or 

two,  and  a  cup  of  tea  without  milk  or  sugar. 
"For  supper,  Three  or  four  ounces  of  meat  or  fish 
similar  to  dinner,  with  a  glass  or  two  of  claret. 
"For  night-cap.  if  required,  a  tumbler  of  grog — 
(gin,  whisky  or  brandy,   without  sugar) — or  a 
glass  or  two  of  claret  or  sherry. 
"This  plan  leads  to  an  excellent  night's  rest,  with 
from  six  to  eight  hours'  sound   sleep.     The   dry  toast 
or  rusk  may  have  a   table-spoonful   of  spirit   to  soften 
it,  which  will  prove  acceptable.     Perhaps  I  did  not 
wholly  escape  starchy  or  saccharine  matter,  but  scru- 
pulously   avoided   those   beans,    such   as   milk,    sugar, 
beer,  butter,  &c,  which  were  known  to  contain  them." 
Mr.    Banting    subsequently   specifies   veal,    pork, 
herring,   eels,   parsnips,   beetroot,   turnips  and   carrots 
as  improper  articles  of  food. 

Now,  before  inquiring  whether  this  dietary  scheme 
be  a  new  discovery  or  not,  we  beg  to  observe  that  Mr. 


BANTING    ON   CORPULENCE.  I  1 

Banting  has  fallen  into  a  monstrous  error  in  asserting 
that  every  substance  tending  to  promote  fatness  or  in- 
crease the  bulk  of  the  human  body  is  necessarily  dele- 
terious. Bis  analogy,  as  he  rails  it.  of  the  beans,  is 
purely  fanciful  ami  absurd.  Farinaceous  food,  which, 
with  extraordinary  presumption  he  denounces  as  un- 
wholesome, forms  the  main  subsistence  of  the  peasantrj', 
not  only  of  the  British  Islands,  but  of  the  whole  of 
Europe;  ami  are  we  now  to  he  told,  forsooth,  that 
bread,  meal,  ami  potatoes  are  "prejudicial  in  advanced 
life," — that  they  may  lie  useful  food  occasionally,  und<  r 
peculiar  circumstances,  hut  detrimental  as  a  con- 
stancy".'" Are  we  to  conclude,  because  Mr.  Banting's 
medical  adviser  prohibited  them,  that  milk  and  butter, 
beer  and  sugar,  are  little  short  of  absolute  poison  '.'  It 
would  he  easy  to  show,  from  the  recorded  tables  of 
longevity, that  the  personswho  have  attained  the  most 
advanced  ages,  far  beyond  the  ordinary  span  of  human 
existence,  have  never  used  any  other  kind  of  diet  save 
that  which  Mr.  Banting's  adviser  has  proscribed  :  but 
the  idea  is  so  manifestly  preposterous,  that  it  carries 
with  it  its  own  refutation.  If  Banting's  hill  of  fare  he 
the  right  one,  and  if  the  articles  which  he  has  been 
advised  to  avoid  are  generally  hurtful  to  adults. — 
Heaven  help  not  only  the  working  classes,  hut  the 
greater  proportion  of  the  middle  order,  who  certainly 
cannot  afford  to  begin  the  day  as  Mr.  Banting  doe-. 
with  a  meat  breakfast  of  kidneys,  broiled  fish,  or  bacon, 
such  as  might  make  a  Frenchman  stare,  to  repeal  the 
diet,  with  the  additions  of  poultry  or  game,  both  for 
dinner  and  supper,  to  interject  a  fruity  tea.  and  to  wash 
down  each  meal  with  a  few  glasses  of  claret,  sherry 
or  .Madeira  ! 

In   fact.  Mr.  Banting  has  fallen   into  the  egregious 


42 


3AXTIXG     OX    CORPCLEXCE. 


error  of  supposing  that  the  food  which  agrees  with 
him  must  agree  with  every  other  human  being,  and 
that  articles  which  have  been,  perhaps  judiciously,  de- 
nied to  him,  must  necessarily  be  hurtful  to  the  rest  of 
mankind.     His  logical  position  is  this  : — 

Banting  is  a  mortal  ; 

Bread,  potatoes,  etc.  are  bad  for  Banting — therefore 

No  mortal  should  eat  bread  or  potatoes. 

But  the  falsity  of  the  syllogism  is  apparent.  We 
are  not  all  afflicted  by  Mr.  Banting's  tendency  toward 
obesity,  and  therefore  we  need  not  regard  "beans" 
with  his  more  than  Pythagorean  horror.  There  is  a 
deep  truth  in  the  old  adage  that  "  what  is  one  man's 
meat  is  another  man's  poison  ;"  and  Mr.  Banting  might 
have  escaped  no  small  amount  of  ridicule,  had  he 
carefully  laid  it  to  heart,  before  promulgating  the  doc- 
trine that  kidneys  are  more  wholesome  than  potatoes, 
and  that  bread  should  be  generally  tabooed. 

We  fully  appreciate  the  excellence  of  the  motive 
which  has  induced  Mr.  Banting  to  oiler  his  observa- 
tions upon  corpulence  to  the  public  ;  but  we  can  in- 
form him  that  there  is  no  kind  of  novelty  in  the  system 
which  was  recommended  by  his  last  medical  adviser, 
and  which  has  led  to  such  fortunate  results.  Training 
has  long  ago  been  reduced  to  a  science,  and  the  diet 
to  be  observed  during  training  has  received  the  most 
careful  attention.  The  following  were  some  of  the 
rules  of  diet  approved  of  by  the  late  John  .Jackson, 
the  celebrated  teacher  of  pugilism,  with  whom  Lord 
Byron  used  to  spar.  They  are  given  at  full  length  in 
Sir  John  Sinclair's  work  upon  health  and  longevity  : — 

"The  diet  is  simple — animal  food  alone  ;  and  it  is 
recommended  to  take  very  little  salt  and  sonic  vinegar 
with  the  food,  which  prevents  thirst,  and  is  good  to 


BANTING    ON   CORPULENCE.  43 

promote  leanness.  Vegetables  are  never  given,  as  tur- 
nips or  carrots,  which  are  difficult  to  digest;  nor  potatoes 
which  are  watery.  Bui  bread  is  allowed,  only  it  must 
be  stale.      Veal  and  lamb  are  never  given,  nor  is  pork, 

which  has  tendency  to  purge  some  people.     Beefsteaks 

are  reckoned  very  good,  and  rather  under-done  than 
otherwise,  as  all  meat  in  general  is  :  and  it  is  better  to 
have  the  meat  broiled  than  roasted  or  boiled,  by  which 
nutriment  is  lost.  No  fish  whatever  is  allowed,  because 
it  is  reckoned  watery,  and  not  to  he  compared  with 
meat  in  point  of  nutriment.  The  tat  of  meat  is  never 
given,  hut  the  lean  of  the  best  meat.  Xo  butter  nor 
cheese  on  any  account.  Pies  and  puddings  are  never 
given,  nor  any  kind  of  pastry."' 

The  like  diet  is  prescribed  for  jockeys,  pedestrians, 
and  all  others  whose  weight  is  to  lie  materially  reduced; 
but  in  such  cases  recourse  is  likewise  had  to  sweatings, 
hard  exercise,  and  preparatory  doses  of  medicine. 
Mr.  Jackson,  however,  says  with  regard  to  training: — 

"A  person  in  high  life  cannot  be  treated  inex- 
actly the  same  manner  at  first,  from  the  indulgences 
to  which  he  has  been  accustomed  :  nor  is  his  frame  in 
general  so  strong.  They  eat  too  much  made  dishes 
and  other  improper  food,  and  sit  too  long  at  table,  and 
eat  too  great  a  variety  of  articles  ;  also  drink  too  much 
wine.  No  man  should  drink  more  than  half  a  pint  of 
wine.  He  says,  moreover,  '  A  course  of  training  would 
be  an  effectual  remedy  for  bilious  complaints.'  <  Jorpu- 
lent  people,  by  the  same  system,  could  he  brought  into 
a  proper  condition.  " 

But,  not  to  multiply  authorities,  which  would  be 
rather  tedious,  let  us  refer  at  once  to  the  "  Physiologic 

du  Gout''  of Mons.  Brillat-Savarin,  a  work  which  has 


44  BANTING    ON    CORPULENCE. 

the  merit  of  being  extremely  popular  and  amusing, 
and  we  shall  presently  see  that  no  new  light  was  (lash- 
ed from  the  scientific  lantern  of  Mr.  Banting's  medical 
adviser.  A  translation,  or  rather  an  abridgment,  of 
that  treatise  was  published  by  Longman  &  Co.,  in 
1859,  nndcr  the  title  of  "The  Hand-hook  of  Dining  ; 
and  from  it  we  extract  the  following  remarks  on 

"  Obesity  or  Embonpoint. 

"  The  primary  cause  of  embonpoint  is  the  na- 
tural disposition  of  the  individual.  Most  men  are 
horn  with  certain  predispositions,  which  are  stamped 
upon  their  features.  Out  of  one  hundred  persons  who 
die  of  consumption,  ninety  have  brown  hair,  a  long 
face,  and  a  sharp  nose.  Out  of  one  hundred  fat  ones, 
nine  have  short  faces,  round  eyes,  and  a  short  nose. 

"  Consequently  there  are  persons  whose  destiny  it 
is  to  be  fat.  This  physical  truth  has  often  given  me 
annoyance.  I  have  at  times  met  in  society  some  dear 
little  creature  with  rounded  arms,  dimpled  cheeks,  and 
hands,  and  pert  little  nose,  fresh  and  blooming,  the 
admiration  of  every  one,  when,  taught  by  experience, 
1  east  a  rapid  mental  glance  through  the  next  ten 
years  of  her  life,  and  I  behold  these  charms  in  another 
light,  and  I  sigh  internally.  This  anticipated  compas- 
sion is  a  painful  feeling,  and  gives  one  more  proof  that 
man  would  lie  very  unhappy  if  he  could  foresee  the 
future. 

"  The  second  and  chief  cause  of  obesity  is  to  he 
found  in  the  mealy  or  floury  substances  of  which  man 
makes  his  food.  All  animals  that  live  on  farinaceous 
food  grow  fat  :  man  follows  the  common  law.  Mixed 
with  sugar,  the  fattening  qualities  increase.  Beer  is 
very    fattening.      Too  much  sleep    and  little    exercise 


BANTING    ON   CORPULENI  E.  16 

will  promote  corpulency.     Another  cause  of  obesity  is 
in  eating  and  drinking  too  much. 

Here  the  whole  philosophy  of  the  mutter  is  set 
forth  in  a  lew  simple  terms.  Certain  people  have  a 
natural  tendency  towards  fat,  and  that  tendency  will 
lie  materially  assisted  by  a  farinaceous  :1ml  saccharine 
diet.  But  so  far  from  regarding  such  substances  as 
unwholesome,  which  view  .Mr.  Banting,  in  his  pure  ig- 
norance has  adopted,  Brillat-Savarin  considers  them 
as  eminently  nutritious  ;  he  would  only  regulate  their 
use  in  eases  where  the  tendency  has  been  clearly  as- 
certained. 

"  Of  all  medical  powers,  diet  is  the  most  efficient, 
because  it  acts  incessantly,  day  and  night,  sleeping 
or  waking:  it  ends  by  subjugating  the  individual. 
Now  the  diet  against  corpulency  is  indicated  by  the 
most  common  and  active  cause  of  obesity  ;  and  as  it 
has  been  proved  that  farinaceous  food  produces  fat,  in 
man  as  well  as  in  animals,  it  may  he  concluded  that 
abstinence  from  farinaceous  substances  tends  to  dimi- 
nish embonpoint. 

"I  hear  my  fair  friends  exclaim  that  I  am  a  mon- 
ster who  wishes  to  deprive  them  of  every  thing  they 
like.      Let  them  not  be   alarmed. 

■•  If  they  must  eat  bread,  let  it  be  brown  bread; 
it  is  very  good,  but  not    so  nutritious  as  white  bread. 

"If  you  are  fond  of  soup,  have  it  it  la  julienne,  or 
with  vegetables,  but    no  paste,  no   macaroni. 

"At  the  first  course  eat  any  thingyou  like,  except 
the  rice  with  fowls,  or  the  crust  oipates. 

"The  second  course  requires  more  philosophy. 
Avoid  everything  farinaceous.  You  can  eat  roast, 
salad  and  vegetables.    And  if  you  must  n Is  have  some 


46  BANTING   ON   CORPULENCE. 

sweets,  take  chocolate,  creams,  and  jellies,  and  punch 
in  preference  to  orange  or  others. 

"  Now  comes  dessert,  New  danger.  But  if  you 
have  been  prudent  so  far,  you  will  continue  to  be  so. 
Avoid  biscuits  and  macaroons  ;  eat  as  much  fruit  as 
you  like. 

Alter  dinner  take  a  cup  of  coffee  and  a  glass  of 
liqueur.     Tea  and  punch  will  not  hurt  you. 

"  At  breakfast  brown  bread  and  chocolate  in  pre- 
ference to  coffee.  No  eggs.  Anything  else  you  like. 
You  cannot  breakfast  too  early.  If  you  breakfast 
late,  the  dinner-hour  comes  before  you  have  properly 
digested  ;  you  do  not  eat  the  less,  and  this  eating 
without  an  appetite  is  a  prime  cause  of  obesity,  be- 
cause it  often  occurs. 

"The  above  regulations  are  to  prevent  embon- 
point. The  following  are  for  those  who  are  already 
victims  : — 

"Drink,  every  summer,  thirty  bottles  of  Seltzer 
water,  a  large  tumblerfull  every  morning,  two  hours  be- 
fore breakfast,  and  the  same  before  3-011  go  to  bed. 
Drink  white  wines  and  rather  acid.  Avoid  beer  like 
the  plague.  Eat  radishes,  artichokes,  celery  ;  eat  veal 
and  chicken  in  preference  to  beef  and  mutton.  Only 
eat  the  crust  of  your  bread  ;  you  will  be  all  the  lighter 
and  younger  for  it.-' 

The  system  recommended  by  Savarin  is,  as  our 
readers  will  observe,  in  essentials  the  same  as  that 
which  Mr.  Banting  has  proclaimed,  with  so  much  pom- 
posity, to  be  an  original  discovery  ;  but  how  infinitely 
more  elegant  and  refined  is  the  carte  sketched  by  the 
Parisian  gastronome  than  the  gross  flesh-market  bill 
of  fare  propounded  by  the  English  epicure  !  D  will  be 
observed  that  veal,   which  is  expressly  forbidden  by 


BANTING   ON   CORPULENCE.  U 

Banting,  is  recommended  by  Savarin.  We  side  in 
opinion  with  the  Frenchman.  Beef,  as  a  constant 
article  of  food,  is  too  nutritious  for  persons  of  a  cor- 
pulent tendency.  Roger  Bacon,  in  his  treatise,  "  !><■ 
retardandis  Senectutis  Malis,"  expressly  forbids  it  to 
old  men.  warning  them,  that,  if  they  accustom  them- 
selves to  eat  such  meat,  dropsies  will  lie  engendered, 
stoppages  in  the  liver,  and  in  like  manner  obstructions 
in  the  spleen,  and  stones  in  the  kidneys  and  bladder. 
Veal  and  chickens,  he  thinks,  ought  decidedly  to  have 
the  preference.  And  the  following  instance  is  strongly 
confirmatory  of  that  view.  Humphreys,  the  pugilist, 
was  trained  by  Kipsham,  the  keeper  of  the  jail  at 
Ipswich.  He  was  sweated  in  bed.  and  afterwards 
twice  physicked.  He  was  weighed  once  a  day,  and  at 
first  fed  on  beef:  but  as  on  that  food  he  got  too  much 
flesh,  they  were  obliged  to  change  it  to  mutton. 

As  there  are  many  persons  whose  health  and 
appearance  would  be  materially  improved  by  putting 
on  a  little  more  of  that  garb  of  flesh  which  has  proved 
such  an  intolerable  burden  to  Mi'.  Banting,  we  confi- 
dently recommend  to  their  study  the  treatise  of  M.  Sav- 
arin, wherein  the  means  of  attaining  a  becoming  degree 
of  pinguitude  are  elaborately  explained.  "  Leanness," 
says  this  wise  philosopher,  "though  it  may  be  no  ab- 
solute disadvantage  to  a  man,  is  a  great  disaster  for 
ladies,  for  beauty  is  their  life,  and  beauty  consists 
chiefly  in  the  rounded  limb  ami  graceful  curve.  The 
most  recherche  toilet,  the  best  dressmakers  in  the  world, 
cannot  supply  certain  absences,  or  hide  certain  angles. 
But  a  woman  who  is  born  thin  may  be  fattened  like  a 
chicken.  It  may  take  more  time.  The  ladies  must 
pardon  me  the  simile,  but  I  could  not  find  a  better." 
Clearly  he  is  in  the   right.     Even  the  savage   instinct 


48  BANTING   ON   CORPULENCE. 

recognizes  the  charms  of  female  pinguitude,  and  takes 
care  that  it  is  properly  cultivated.  Art  follows  closed}' 
in  the  wake  of  instinct.  What  painter  has  ever  dared 
to  depict,  or  what  sculptor  to  chisel  out,  a  wood-nymph 
in  attenuated  form,  or  an  angular  and  scraggy  Venus  ? 
No  wonder  that  Mr.  Banting,  having  a  natural 
tendency  towards  corpulence,  found  himself,  in  his 
sixty-third  year,  much  fatter  than  was  at  all  conve- 
nient. He  has,  with  amiable  candor,  given  us  a  sketch 
of  his  former  dietary,  and  after  perusing  it,  we  cannot 
wonder  at  the  result.  Buttered  toast,  beer  and  pastry 
were  his  favorite  articles  of  consumption  ;  and  more- 
over, he  was  in  the  habit  of  taking  four  meals  a  day, 
which  is  greatly  too  much  for  a  man  of  sedentary 
habits  and  occupation.  We  are  strongly  inclined  to 
think  that  if  Mr.  Banting  had  somewhat  restrained  his 
appetite,  practised  occasional  fastings,  and  entirely 
abstained  from  heavy,  wet,  buttered  crumpets,  muffins, 
and  patisserie,  he  would  have  fully  attained  his  object, 
without  discontinuing  the  use  of  bread, sugar  or  potatoes. 
Men  have  been  known  materially  to  reduce  their 
weight,  and  at  the  same  time  to  gain  additional  health 
and  strength,  by  restricting  themselves  entirely  to  the 
use  of  the  simplest  farinaceous  food.  Such  is  the  case 
of  Wood,  the  miller  of  Billerieray,  in  Essex,  stated  in 
the  ''Transactions  of  the  London  College  of  Physi- 
cians." This  man,  it  would  appear,  had  attained  to 
such  a  degree  of  corpulency  by  the  free  use  of  flesh 
meat  and  ale  that  his  life  had  become  a  burden  to  him  ; 
but  he  succeeded  in  reducing  himself  to  a  moderate 
bulk  by  the  following  means  :  His  reformed  diet  con- 
sisted of  a  simple  pudding  made  by  boiling  coarse  flour 
in  water,  without  salt.  Of  this  he  consumed  about 
three  pounds  in  twenty-four  hours,  and  took  no  fluid 


BANTING   ON   CORPULENCE.  l!) 

whatever,  not  oven  water.  On  this  he  lived  in  perfe<  t 
health  for  many  years,  went  through  a  greal  deal  of 
exercise  in  the  open  air,  and  was  able  to  earn  five 
hundred  pounds'  weight,  "  which"  says  our  authority, 
"  was  more  than  he  could  lift  in  his  youth,  when  In 
lived  on  animal  food,  and  drank  freely  of  ale."  In 
fact,  the  man  fed  upon  porridge,  from  time  immemo- 
rial the  favorite  diet  of  the  Scottish  peasantry,  among 
whom  obesity  is  unknown.  Tare  farinaceous  food  can 
never  be  hurtful.  On  the  contrary,  as  Mr.  Banting 
may  learn  from  a  perusal  of  the  first  chapter  of  the 
hook  of  Daniel,  it  is  infinitely  more  wholesome  both 
for  mind  and  body  than  a  dietary  of  butcher-meal  and 
wine.  But  buttered  toast,  pastry,  ami  beer  are  proper 
materials  for  the  formation  of  a  Lambert  :  and  so  long- 
as  Mr.  Banting  indulged  freely  in  those  luxuries,  which 
we  object  not  to  his  stigmatizing  as  "beans,"  he  was 
necessarily  compelled  periodically  to  enlarge  the  limits 
of  his  girdle. 

Mr.  Banting,  with  great  propriety,  wishes  that  the 
subjed  should  he  well  "ventilated."  and  we  are  doing 
our  very  best  to  gratify  that  desire.  His  own  expe- 
riences, we  are  bound  to  admit,  have  been  quite  satis- 
factory,  inasmuch  as,  by  adopting  a  certain  dietary,  he 
has  reduced  his  weight  from  fourteen  stone  six  pounds 
to  ten  stone  ten  pounds  with  apparent  advantage  to 
his  health,  and  hitherto  without  any  evil  consequence. 
It  is  also  remarkable  that  these  results  have  been  at- 
tained without  the  necessity  of  having  recourse  to 
violent  exercise  or  the  use  of  medicine,  which  latter 
consideration  is  undoubtedly  in  favor  of  his  system. 
Mr.  Banting  indeed  makes  mention  of  a  certain  cor- 
rective cordial  which  he  calls  the  "  Balm  of  Life,"  a 
spoonful  of  which  taken  before  breakfast,  he  found  re- 

D 


50  BANTING    ON    CORPULENCE. 

markably  salutary.  The  recipe  for  this  draught  lie 
declines  to  give,  but  we  have  little  doubt  that  it  is  of 
the  same  nature  as  that  recommended  by  Mons.  Brillat- 
Savario  for  the  reduction  of  embonpoint  ;  namely,  a 
tea  spoonful  of  bark,  to  be  taken  in  a  glass  of  white 
wine,  about  two  hours  before  breakfast.  But  he  does 
not  seem  to  have  used  any  medicines  of  a  purgative 
nature,  such  as  trainers  sometimes  administer, — a  de- 
cided point  in  his  favor  :and  altogether  it  is  reasonable 
that  he  should  hug  himself  on  the  successful  result  o1" 
his  experiment.  But  nostrums,  if  we  may  use  such  a 
term,  are  not  infallible.  Mr.  Banting  is  to  be  com- 
mended for  his  prudence  in  not  insisting  too  strongly 
upon  the  universal  applicability  of  his  system,  which 
may  not,  as  he  candidly  admits,  lie  suitable  for  every 
constitution;  for  great  barm  might  ensue  if  his  sug- 
gestions were  to  be  implicitly  adopted,  and  violent 
changes  made  in  their  dietary  and  mode  of  living  by 
persons  whose  bulk  is  not  excessive.  All  sudden 
changes  of  diet  are  hazardous  ;  and  more  especially 
when  the  change  is  made  from  what  is  usually  con- 
sidered a  light  diet — that  is,  one  in  which  vegetable 
substances  predominate — to  a  heavier  kind  of  nutri- 
ment. Excellent  is  the  advice  given  in  the  Regimen 
Sanitatis  of  Salerno. 

"  Omnibus  adsuetain  jubco  servare  diaetam, 
Quod  sic  esse  probo,  ne  sit  mutare  neeesse." 

Unless  much  exercise  is  taken  there  is  great  risk 
that  such  changes  will  engender  acute  disease  ;  and 
men  of  sedentary  habits  should  be  very  caution  of 
adopting  what  Mr.  Banting  is  pleased  to  denominate 
a  "luxurious  and  liberal  dietary."  Failing  exercise, 
their  best  means  of  maintaining  health  is  to  use  fre- 
quent abstinence,  and  always  to  be  strictly  temperate. 


BANTING   OX   CORPULENCE.  51 

Meat  breakfasts,  and  continuous  indulgence  in  the 
flesh-pots  of  Egypt,  are  every  whit  as  dangerous  as 
the  copious  imbibation  of  wine,  or  the  consumption  of 

anient  spirits  ;  and  they  may  be  confidenl  of  this,  thai 
a  gross  gladiatorial  diet  will  neither  secure  them  im- 
munity from  disease,  nor  promote  their  chances  <>t* 
longevity.  Man  is  an  omnivorous  animal  ;  but  nature 
by  limiting  the  number  of  his  canine  teeth,  has  dis- 
tinctly indicated  that  animal  food  ought  to  form  the 
smallest  portion  of  his  nutriment.  Dr.  Chevne.  in 
his  "  Essay  on  Health,"  gives  the  following  calcu- 
lation of  the  quantity  of  food  sufficient  to  keep  a 
man  of  ordinary  stature,  following  no  laborious 
employment,  in  due  plight,  health  and  vigor.  He 
allows  eight  ounces  of  flesh  meat,  twelve  ounces  of 
bread  or  vegetable  food,  and  about  a  pint  of  wine 
or  other  generous  liquor,  in  the  twenty-four  hours. 
But  he  adds  that  the  valetudinary,  and  those  employed 
in  sedentary  professions  or  intellectual  studies,  must 
lessen  this  quantity,  if  they  would  wish  to  preserve 
their  health  and  the  freedom  of  their  spirits  long. 
That  may  appear  but  spare  diet  ;  and  we  freely  grant 
that  a  foxhunter  or  other  keen  sportsman  might  add 
to  the  allowance  both  solid  and  liquid,  without  any 
risk  of  evil  consequences.  But  no  man  engaged  in 
literary  work  will  he  able  to  accomplish  anything 
worth  sending  to  the  printer,  if  he  begins  the  day  with 
kidneys,  bacon,  and  mutton-chops,  indulges  in  four 
substantial  meals,  and  crams  himself  with  as  much 
butcher-meat  as  would  satisfy  the  maw  of  a  hyena. 
Of  course  his- stomach  would  he  equally  clogged  and 
his  brain  addled  if  he  stuffed  himself  with   buttered 

toast,  muffins,    beer  and    pastry  ;    hut    such  viands    are 

more  allected  by  Ladies  of  Mrs.  Q-amp's  profession  than 


0-2  BANTING    ON    CORPULENCE. 

by  men  of  intellectual  pursuits,  who  know  and  feel 
that  a  clear  head  and  a  light  stomach  arc  indispensable 
for  the  prosecution  of  their  labors. 

We  rise  from  the  perusal  of  Mr.  Banting's  pamphlet 
with  our  belief  quite  unshaken  in  the  value  of  bread 
and  potatoes  as  ordinary  and  universal  articles  of  diet. 
We  maintain  the  excellency  and  innocency  of  porridge 
and  pease-pudding  ;  and  we  see  no  reason  for  suppos- 
ing that  any  one  will  become  a  Jeshurun  because  he 
uses  milk  with  Ins  tea,  and  sweetens  it  with  a  lump  of 
sugar.  Starch  and  sugar  are  eminently  nutritious,  hut 
they  are  not  therefore  unwholesome  ;  on  the  contrary, 
if  used  in  moderation,  they  will  promote  longevity, 
and  prevent  many  of  those  diseases  which  the  copious 
consumption  of  flesh  is  exceedingly  apt  to  engender. 
Mr.  Banting  has  certainly  found  a  remedy  for  the  com- 
plaint which  weighed  so  heavily  on  his  spirits  :  hut  we 
feel  assured  that  he  would  have  found  the  same  meas- 
ure of  relief,  had  he  simply  exercised  some  control 
over  his  appetite,  given  his  stomach  more  time  to  di- 
gest, by  lessening  the  inordinate  number  of  his  meals, 
abstained  altogether  from  beer,  and  resolutely  steeled 
his  heart  against  the  manifold  temptations  of  the  pastry- 
cook. We  advise  no  one,  whatever  he  his  weight  or 
girth,  to  adopt  implicitly  the  system  recommended  by 
Mr.  Banting,  at  least  until  he  has  tried  the  effect  of  a 
temperate  mixed  diet  (the  vegetable  element  prepon- 
derating) combined  with  early  hours  and  a  due  amount 
of  exercise.  We  have  no  sympathy  with  the  vegeta- 
rians who  decry  the  use  of  animal  food,  and  believe 
that  Nebuchadnezzar's  hallucination  in  the  way  of 
pasturage  was  prompted  by  a  natural  instinct  ;  hut  we 
are  assured  there  is  no  instance  on  record  of  death 
ensuing  from  the   use   of  farinaceous    food,   whereas 


BANTING    ON   CORPULENCE.  53 

close  behind  the  carniverous  gorger  stalks  the  hideous 
form  of  apoplexy,  ready  to  smite  him  down  when  his 
stomach  is  full,  and  the  veins  of  his  forehead  distended 
with  indulgence  in  his  fleshly  lusts.  A  mixed  diel  is 
the  best  :  and  after  all  that  has  hern  said  and  written 
on  the  subject,  temperance  is  the  one  thing  needful  to 
secure  a  man  against  the  evils  of  inordinate  obesity. 


ON  CORPULENCY  AND  LEANNESS. 

FROM   HARPER'S    WEEKLY. 


By  obesity  we  mean  that  state  of  fatty  congestion 
when,  without  the  individual  being  ill,  the  limbs  or 
members  increase  gradually  in  size  ami  lose  their  prim- 
itive form  and  beauty.  Then-  i^  one  sort  of  obesity 
which  is  confined  to  the  stomach.  This  is  seldom 
found  in  women.  "I  myself,"  says  Savarin,  "am  a 
sufferer  in  this  respect  :  yet  I  have  an  ancle,  instep  ami 
calf  as  firm  as  an  Arabian  horse.  Nevertheless  I 
looked  upon  my  stomach  as  a  most  formidable  enemy; 
I  conquered  it,  and  reduced  it  to  its  proper  dimen- 
sions." The  principal  causes  of  corpulency  may  be 
easily  stated.  The  first  is  the  natural  conformation  of 
the  individual.  Every  man  is  born  with  certain  pic- 
dispositions,  which  may  be  traced  in  his  physiognomy. 
Oni  of  one  hundred  persons  who  die  of  consumption, 
ninety  have  brown  hair,  an  oval  lac  and  sharp  DOSe. 
<  )ut  of  one  hundred  "  corpulents,"  ninety  have  a  round 
face,  globular  eyes  and  pug  nose.  It  is  therefore  be- 
yond a  doubt  that  some  persons  are  predestined  to  be 
fat.  and  that,  taking  all  things  equally,  their  digestive 
powers  produce  a  greater  portion  of  fat.     Ami  here 

let  ns  rite  a  few  instances  of  men  of  weight.  M.  ban- 
rent  notices  a   Parisian    boy  who  must    have  frighten  id 

his  parents  a  little,  for  he  weighed. a  hundred  ami  four 
pounds  at  four  years  old.     There  was  a   boy  a1   Win- 

laton.    in    Durham,  about    a  century  ago,  who.   at    the 

age  of  ten  years,  measured   thirteen  inches   round    the 

thigh,  and  thirty -three  round  the  waist  ;  he  was  a  on  ^'v 


00         ON  CORPULENCY  AND  LEANNESS. 

fellow  in  other  ways,  for  he  had  six  toes  on  each  foot, 
and  six  fingers  on  one  hand.  In  178-4  died  an  Irish 
gentleman,  Mr.  Lovelace  Love,  from  very  fatness. 
So  immense  was  his  bulk  that  his  coffin  measured 
seven  feet  in  length,  four  in  breadth,  and  three  and  a  half 
in  depth.  Mr.  Baker,  who  died  at  Worcester  in  1700, 
was  so  large  a  man  that,  in  the  language  of  the  local 
prints,  "his  coffin  measured  seven  feet  over,  and  was 
bigger  than  an  ordinary  hearse,  and  part  of  the  wall 
was  obliged  to  be  taken  down  to  admit  its  passage." 
Six  years  afterwards  there  died  at  Usk,  in  Monmouth- 
shire, one  Mr.  Philip  Mason,  whose  dimensions  were 
recorded  as  follows  :  round  the  wrist,  eleven  inches  ; 
round  the  upper  arm,  twentj'-one  inches  ;  round  the 
chest,  sixty  inches  ;  round  the  largest  part  of  the  hotly, 
seventy-two  inches  :  round  the  thigh,  thirty-seven 
inches  ;  round  the  calf  of  the  leg,  twenty-live  inches. 
The  above  instances  are  wanting  in  facilities  for  com- 
parison, on  account  of  the  actual  weights  being,  in 
most  cases,  unrecorded.  We  give  the  following  as 
instances  more  specifically  definite  on  this  point.  There 
was  a  Kentish  fanner  and  inn-keeper,  one  Mr.  Palmer, 
who  attracted  much  attention  in  the  early  part  of  the 
present  century  by  Ins  enormous  hulk.  He  weighed 
three  hundred  and  fifty  pounds.  Five  ordinary  men 
could  he  buttoned  at  one  time  within  his  waistcoat. 
He  came  to  London  to  see  the  famous  Daniel  Lambert. 
The  two  men  looked  at  each  other.  Lambert  was 
vastly  the  superior  of  Palmer  in  hulk,  but  the  latter 
puffed  so  much  through  his  fatness  that  Lambert  pitied 
him  as  a  man  to  whom  life  must  have  been  a  burden. 
Palmer  went  home  much  mortified;  his  claim  to  noto- 
riety was  suddenly  eclipsed  by  a  rival,  and  his  vexa- 
tion hastened  his  death.  A  part  of  his  inn  had  to  be 
taken  down  to  allow  room  for  his  coffin  to  be  removed. 


OX   CORPULENCE  AND    LEANNESS.  57 

John  Love  was  so  thin  and  meagre,  thai  a  physician 
advised  him  to  eat  liberaUy.  The  advice  was  so  well 
taken  that  John  became  a  gormandizer  ;  his  Fatness 
killed  him  at  the  age  of  forty,  when  he  weighed  three 
hundred  and  sixty-four  pounds.  Mr.  Benjamin  Bower, 
a  native  of  Holt,  in  Dorsetshire,  attained  a  weighl  of 
four  hundred  and  seventy  pounds.  In  177  1  there  died 
in  Lincolnshire  one  Mr.  Pell,  who  weighed  five  hundred 
and  sixty  pounds.  He  was  inclosed  in  three  coffins, 
the  united  weight  of  which,  with  himself,  exceeded 
three  thousand  pounds.  Mr.  Bright,  of  Essex,  was  a 
person  of  great  notoriety  in  the  early  days  of  the  reign 

of  George  the  Third.  He  died  at  the  age  of  thirty. 
His  weight  was  six  hundred  and  sixteen  pounds. 
Seven  men  were,  on  one  particular  occasion,  buttoned 
up  within  his  waistcoat.  When  his  career  was  ended, 
and  his  body  was  encased  in  its  monster  coffin,  not  only 
walls,  but  staircases,  had  to  fie  cut  through  before  it 
could  he  got  out  :  twelve  men  drew  the  low  carriage 
on  which  the  coffin  wasplaced;and  "  an  engine  was  fixed 
upon  the  church,"  as  the  local  chroniclers  narrate,  to  low- 
er the  coffin  into  the  grave.  There  was  an  Irishman, 
Roger  Byrne,  who  died  in  1804,  whose  bulk  was  so 
great  that  his  admirers  claimed  for  him  the  merit  of 
being  "several  stones  heavier  than  the  celebrated  Mr. 
Bright  of  Essex."  It  required  thirty  men  to  carry  to 
the  grave  the  bier  on  which  his  body  was  laid.  Mr- 
Spooner,  a  Tamworth  man.  who  was  living  in  177"), 
attained  a  weight  of  six  hundred  and  eighty  pounds. 
He  had  long  been  too  heavy  to  walk,  his  legs  being  una- 
ble to  hear  him.  lie  measured  four  feet  three  inches 
across  the  shoulders.  It  is  recorded  of  him  that  his 
"  fatness  once  saved  his  life  ;  for,  being  al  Atherstone 
market,  and  some  difference  arising  between  him  and 
a  dew,  the  Jew  stabbed  him  ill  the  belly  with  a  pen- 


58         ON  CORPULENCY  AND  LEANNESS. 

knife  ;  but  the  blade  being  short,  did  not  pierce  his 
bowels,  or  even  pass  through  the  fat  which  defended 
them."  But  of  men  of  weight  Daniel  Lambert  was 
the  king.  Shortly  before  his  death  he  attained  the 
unprecedented  weight  of  seven  hundred  and  thirty- 
nine  pounds.  His  coffin  was  seventy-six  inches  long 
by  fifty-two  wide,  and  contained  a  hundred  and  twelve 
square  feet  of  elm.  The  coffin  was  regularly  built 
upon  axles  and  wheels  ;  and  not  only  the  window,  but 
also  the  side  of  a  room,  had  to  be  taken  down  to  afford 
a  passage  for  the  bulky  mass.  The  wheeled  coffin  was 
drawn  to  St.  Martin's  church-yard,  where  a  gradual 
descent  was  made  to  the  grave  by  excavating  the 
ground. 

The  second  and  principal  cause  of  corpulency  con- 
sists in  the  farinaceous  substances  which  man  eats  at 
his  daily  meals.  All  animals  that  are  fed  upon  farina- 
ceous food  become  fat  whether  they  will  or  not.  Man 
is  subject  to  the  same  law.  Another  cause  of  corpu- 
lency is  too  much  sleep,  and  a  want  of  sufficient 
exercise.  A  last  cause  of  corpulency  consists  in  excess 
in  eating  and  drinking.  Corpulency  is  detrimental  to 
strength,  because,  while  increasing  the  weight  you 
have  to  carry,  it  does  not  increase  the  motive  power. 
It  is  also  detrimental  because  it  impedes  respiration, 
which  renders  impossible  any  labor  which  requires  a 
prolonged  exertion  of  muscular  strength.  Corpulency 
is  detrimental  to  beauty,  as  it  destroys  the  harmony  of 
proportions  established  by  nature  :  it  carries  with  it  a 
distaste  for  dancing,  walking,  riding,  and  an  inaptitude 
for  any  occupation  or  amusement  requiring  a  little  ex- 
ertion or  skill.  It,  moreover,  leads  to  apoplexy,  dropsy, 
swelling  in  the  legs,  and  impairs  the  health  generally. 
But  corpulency  is  not  a  malady  ;  it  is  at  most  a  lamen- 
table result  of  an  inclination  to  which  we  give  way, 


ON*  CORITI.EXCY  ANH    LEANNESS.  59 

and  wo  alone  are  to  blame.  When  we  meet  in  BOCietj 
a  charming  little  girl,  with  rosy  cheeks  and  rounded 
arms,  dimpled  hands,  a  m :. n  troum  .  and  pretty  little 
feet,  instructed  by  experience,  we  casl  a  glance  ten 
years  forward,  and  foresee  the  ravages  of  corpulency 
upon  those  youthful  charms,  and  sigh  upon  other  evils 
looming  in  the  future.  To  cure  corpulency  the  pre- 
cepts of  absolute  theory  must  lie  adhered  to:  Discre- 
tion in  eating  :  moderation  in  sleep  ;  exercise  on  foot 
or  on  horseback.  It  requires  a  firm  will  to  leave  the 
dinner-table  with  an  appetite.  As  long  as  the  craving 
is  felt  one  morsel  invokes  another  with  irresistible 
attraction,  and.  generally  speaking,  we  eat  as  long  as 
we  are  hungry,  despite  the  doctors,  and  even  the  ex- 
ample of  doctors.  To  tell  a  person  of  embonpoint  to 
get  up  early  in  the  morning  is  to  break  his  (or  her) 
heart :  they  will  tell  you  that  it  will  ruin  their  health, 
and  render  them  unfit  for  anything  during  the  rcsi  of 
the  day  :  the  ladies  will  complain  that  their  eyes  look 
heavy  ;  they  will  all  consent  to  sit  up  late,  hut  they 
must  have  a  long  snooze  in  the  morning,  and  thereby 
is  one  remedy  lost.  Propose  to  a  pretty  fat  girl  to 
ride,  she  will  consent  with  delight,  hut  on  three  con- 
ditions: she  must  have  a  handsome  and  quiet  horse,  a 
well-made  habit  of  the  last  fashion,  and  a  gay  young 
fellow  to  ride  with.      Now    these    three    things  are    not 

always  to  he  had,  so  riding  is  given  up.  Walking  has 
many  other  objections.     It  is  so  fatiguing,  the  mud  and 

the  dust    are    dreadful,  and   the   stones   cut    the    pretty 

little  boots,  and  that  plan  is  peremptorily  abandoned. 
But  in  place  of  this  natural  course  of  treatment,  sly 
puss  takes  to  drinking — yes.  drinking  vinegar.  And 
here  we  would  warn  .Miss  (ireatox  against  the  great 
evils  resulting  from  a  habitual  use  of  acids.  There  is 
no  douht  but  they  will  make  a  person  thin  ;   but    they 


GO  ON    CORPULENCY  AND    LEANNESS. 

destroy  freshness,  health,  even  life  itself,  as  the  follow- 
ing story  of  poor  Louise  too  truly  shows  : 

"  I  had  a  Platonic  friendship  for  one  of  the  most 

charming  persons  I  have  ever  met.     Louise was 

a  lovely  girl,  and  had  that  classical  embonpoint  which 
charms  the  eye  and  is  the  glory  of  sculptors.  Though 
only  a  friend,  I  was  not  blind  to  her  attractions,  and 
this  is  perhaps  why  I  observed  her  so  closely.  '  Chere 
amie,'  I  said  to  her  one  evening,  'you  are  not  well  ; 
you  seem  to  be  thinner."  '  Oh  no,'  she  said,  with  a 
smile  which  partook  of  melancholy,  '  I  am  very  well  ; 
and  if  I  am  a  little  thinner  1  can  very  well  afford  it." 
'Afford  it!"  I  said,  with  warmth;  'you  can  afford 
neither  to  gain  nor  lose  ;  remain  beautiful  as  you  are,' 
and  other  phrases  pardonable  to  a  young  man  of  twenty. 
After  that  conversation  I  watched  her  more  closely, 
with  an  interest  not  untinged  with  anxiety  ;  gradually 
I  saw  her  cheeks  fall  in,  her  figure  decline.  One  eve- 
ning at  a  ball,  after  dancing  a  quadrille,  I  cross-ques- 
tioned her,  and  she  reluctantly  avowed  that,  her  school 
friends  having  laughed  at  her,  and  told  her  that  in  two 
years  she  would  be  as  fat  as  St.  Christopher,  she  had 
for  more  than  a  month  drunk  a  glass  of  vinegar  every 
morning  ;  she  added  that  she  had  not  told  anybody  of 
it.  I  shuddered  when  I  heard  her  confession  ;  I  was 
aware  of  the  danger  she  incurred,  and  next  day  I  in- 
formed her  mother,  who  was  terribly  alarmed,  for  she 
doted  upon  her  child.  No  time  was  lost.  The  very 
best  advice  was  taken.  All  in  vain!  The  springs  of 
life  had  been  attacked  at  the  source,  and  when  the 
danger  was  suspected  all  hope  was  already  gone.  Thus 
for  having  followed  an  ignorant  advice  poor  Louise 
Avas  carried  to  her  grave  in  her  eighteenth  year,  her 
last  days  embittered  by  the  thought  that  she  herself 
had  cut  short  her  existence." 


ON    CORPULENCY  AND    LEANNESS.  61 

On  the  subjecl  of  reducing  corpulence  Mr.  Wm. 
Banting  has  given  an  instructing  and  amusing  account 
of  his  own  experience  in  a  letter  which  he  has  published. 

Although  not  very  corpulent,  the  adipose  tissues  had 
collected  in  those  parts  of  the  body  which  interfered 
with  the  circulation,  and  in  the  course  of  one  year,  by 
discontinuing  a  mosl  injudicious  and  unlimited  dietary 

for  one  which  his  medical  man  had  the  ureal  judgment 
to  prescribe  by  weight,  he  lost  his  tat  and  the  incon- 
veniences that  attended  its  presence.  His  weighl  on 
the 7th September,  L862,  was  200 pounds  ;  on  the  L2th 
September,  1863.  156  pounds — loss  of  weight,  II 
pounds.  In  addition  to  which,  lie  says  that  his  girth 
round  the  waist  is  reduced  \'2h  inches,  he  can  tie  his 
shoes,    he   has   more   muscular   vigor,    eats   ami    drinks 

with  a  good  appetite,  sleeps  well,  and  is  relieved  from 
all  symptoms  of  acidity,  indigestion,  and  heart-lmrn. 
with  which  he  was  once  tormented.  But  the  diet  he 
pursued  is  objectionable  from  several  points  of  view  : 
and  in  order  that  our  guests  the  Greatoxes  may  have 
every  advantage  to  cure  themselves  of  this  growing 
evil,  we  have  placed,  as  they  will  perceive,  our  own 
hill  of  fare  before  them. 
DIETARY  FOR  THE  CORPULENT  AND  THOSE 

WHO  AUK  INCLINED  TO   BE  So. 
Corpuk  nt  persons  should  eat  in  moderatt   quantity  any 

of  the  following  articles  qffoorf. 
The  Lean  of  Butchers'  Meat. 
Poultry — Oame. 

Fish,  fresh  or  salted— Eggs— Toast  for  ordinary  bread 

— Greens — Cabbage— Watercress  -  Spinach. 

And  avoid  Eating 

Fat  or  Potted   Meats. 

Bread — Biscuits — Rice     Arrow-root—  Sago  -Macaroni 
— Vermicelli — Puddings  and  Pastry  of  all  kinds 

Custards — Cheese — Butter — Cream. 
Sugar  in  any  form. 


b2  OX    CORPULENCY  AND    LEANNESS. 

Potatoes — Parsnips — Turnips — Carrots. 
Fruits  of  all  kinds,  fresh  or  preserved. 

They  may  Drink 
Tea  and  Coffee,  without  sugar  or  cream. 
Acid  Wines— Claret— Dry  Sherry— Seltzer',  or    Soda 

Water. 
Unsweetened  Spirits  in  great  moderation. 

And  avoid  Drinking 

Stout — Porter  and  Ale  of  all  kinds — Milk — Sweet  and 

Port  Wines — Liqueurs— Cocoa  and  Chocolate. 

A  few  words  now  to  the  Lankvs. 

Leanness  is  the  condition  or  state  of  an  individual 
whose  muscular  flesh,  not  being  sufficiently  provided 
with  fat,  betrays  the  forms  and  angles  of  his  bonv  con- 
formation. Leanness  is  not  a  disadvantage  to  men. 
Their  strength  is  not  affected  by  it,  and  they  are  even 
more  vigorous.  But  leanness  in  the  fair  sex  is  a  dread- 
ful evil,  tor  with  them  beauty  is  more  than  life,  and 
beauty  consists  especially  in  the  rounded  limb  and 
the  graceful  curve.  The  most  recherche  toilet,  the  best 
dress-maker  in  the  world,  cannot  conceal  certain  "  ab- 
sences," or  disguise  certain  angles  ;  and  it  has  been 
not  wrongly  said  that  every  pin  which  a  thin  woman 
takes  out,  no  matter  how  beautiful  she  may  have 
appeared,  lessens  her  charms.  But  women  who  are 
born  thin  and  have  a  good  stomach  may  be  fatted  like 
fowls  (the  Miss  Lankvs  will  please  forgive  us  for  this 
comparison,  but  it  is  the  mildest  we  could  hit  upon)  ; 
and  should  a  little  more  time  be  requisite,  it  is  because 
the  stomach  of  a  woman  is  comparatively  smaller,  and 
they  cannot  be  subjected  to  a  rigorous  regime,  punct- 
ually enforced.  Persons  destined  to  be  thin  are  con- 
structed in  an  elongated  shape.  They  generally  have 
thin  hands  and  feet,  skinny  legs,  not  much  flesh  about 
the  lower  part  of  the  body,  their  ribs  visible,  an  aqui- 
line nose,  almond-shaped  eyes,  a  large  mouth,  pointed 
chin,  and  brown  hair.   Such  is  the  general  type.   Some 


ON  CORPULENCY  AND  LEANNESS.        63 

portions  of  the  body  may  escape  this  description,  but 
rarely.      Some  lean  persons  have  voracious  appetites. 

Bui  every  thin  woman  wishes  to  be  stouter.  This  is  a 
wish  we  have  heard  expressed  a  thousand  times.  Now 
the  whole  secret  for  a  thin  lady  to  acquire  a  little  em- 
bonpoint lies  in  a  nut-shell.     It  consists  in  a  suitable 

regime.      She  must  learn  how  to  select  and  how  to  eat 

her  food.  We  shall  therefore  endeavor  to  point  out 
the  system  which  ladies  ought  to  follow  who  wish  to 
become  more  plump,  or,  to  use  the  more  elegant  term, 
who  are  desirous  of  acquiring  "  the  rounded  limb  anil 
the  graceful  curve." 

GENERAL  RULES. 

Eat  a  quantity  of  fresh  bread — the  same  day's 
baking — and  do  not  throw  away  the  crumb. 

Before  eight  a.  m.,  when  in  bed,  lake  a  basin  of 
soup  (potage  mi  jiuin  or  auxpates),  not  too  much,  or,  if 
you  prefer  it,  a  cup  of  good  chocolate. 

Breakfast  at  eleven.  Fresh  Eggs,  boiled  or  poach- 
ed, petit  pates,  cutlets,  or  any  thing  else  :  hut  eggs  are 
essential:     A.  cup  of  coffee  will  not  hurt. 

After  breakfast  take  a  little  exercise.  Go  shopping, 
or  call  upon  a  friend,  sit  and  chat,  and  walk  home  again. 

At  dinner,  eat  as  much  soup,  meat,  and  fish  as  yon 
like,  but  do  not  omit  to  eat  the  rice  with  the  fowl. 
macaroni,  sweet  pastry,  creams,  ete. 

At  dessert,  Savoy  biscuits,  babas,  and  other  farina- 
ceous preparations  which  contain  eggs  and  sugar. 

This  diet  may  seem  limited,  hut  it  is  capable  of 
great  variation,  comprising  the  whole  animal  kingdom. 

Drink  beer  by  preference  :  otherwise  Bordeaux,  or 
wine  from  the  south  of  France. 

Avoid  acids;  except  salad,  which  gladdens  the 
heart.      Eat   sugar  with   your   fruit,  if  it   admits   of  it. 

Do  not  take  baths  t old  :    breathe  the  fresh  air  of  the 

country  as  often  as  you  can  :  eat  plenty  of  grapes  when 
in  season:  do  not  fatigue  yourself  by  dancing  al  a  ball. 

Go  to  bed  at  eleven  o'clock  :  on  extra  eights  be  in 
bed  by  one. 


G4  ON    CORPULENCY   AND    LEANNESS. 

If  this  system  is  boldly  and  exactly  adhered  to,  the 
failings  of  nature  will  soon  be  supplied  ;  health  and 
beauty  will  be  the  result. 

Lean  persons  should  be  well  clothed,  according  to  the 
season,  regulated  by  their  feelings  ;  taking  care  to  have 
their  extremities  kept  warm,  and  to  avoid  being  chilled. 
We  now  place  before  our  Lanky  guests  a  bill  of 
fare  for  their  guidance,  and  may  they  feel  ever  grate- 
'ful  to  the  All-Vise  for  his  increasing  bounties! 
DIETARY  FOR   LEAN  PERSONS. 
Lean  Persons  May  Eat 
Fresh  Butchers'  Meat,  of  all  kinds,  because  it  contains 

the  largest  amount  of  nourishment. 
Game— Poultry.     Fish  of  all  kinds. 
Soups   Broths,'  and  Beef  Tea,  thickened  with  Bread  or 

any  farinaceous  or  vegetable  substance. 
Eggs— Butter— Cheese— Cream. 
Sweetened  Jellies— Custards— Blanc-mange,  etc. 
Ripe  Fruits,  fresh  or  preserved. 
Sugar,  in  almost  any  form— Honey. 
Farinaceous    Substances,    such    as    Bread— Biscuits— 

Arrow-root— Sago— Tapioca— Rice— Potatoes. 
Saccharine    Roots,   as   Parsnips— Carrots— Turnips— 

Beet-root. 
Vegetables,  as  Cauliflowers— Asparagus— Sea-kale. 

They  Should  Avoid  Eating 
All  kinds  of  Salted  Meats  and  Fish.    Pickles— Lemons. 

And  Drinking 
Sour  Wines— Acids— Yinegar. 

May  Drink 
Cocoa— Chocolate— Coffee— Tea,  and  Milk. 
Generous  Wines— Ale— Stout— Liqueurs. 
Cod-liver  Oil  is  a  most  nutritious  substance,  and  a  ta- 
blespoonful  twice  or  thrice  a  day  has  in  numerous 
cases  proved  highly  beneficial. 
But  oh,  Greatoxes  and  Lankys !  we   do  not   live 
upon  what  we  eat,  but  what  we  digest.     Digest  well, 
therefore,  the  words  we  have  spoken,  and  then  to  din- 
ner with  what  appetite  you  may. 


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